Sapient Capital LLC Lowers Stake in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

Sapient Capital LLC lowered its stake in shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR) by 48.1% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,498 shares of the conglomerate’s stock after selling 2,319 shares during the quarter. Sapient Capital LLC’s holdings in Danaher were worth $574,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in DHR. FMR LLC raised its position in shares of Danaher by 15.8% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 23,617,424 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $6,566,116,000 after buying an additional 3,217,631 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA raised its position in shares of Danaher by 17.6% during the 3rd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 3,582,982 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $996,141,000 after buying an additional 535,254 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its position in shares of Danaher by 40,196.5% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 429,964 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $119,539,000 after buying an additional 428,897 shares in the last quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. raised its position in shares of Danaher by 30.4% during the 3rd quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. now owns 1,705,884 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $465,617,000 after buying an additional 397,671 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Union Bancaire Privee UBP SA purchased a new stake in shares of Danaher during the 4th quarter valued at $74,551,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.05% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

DHR has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. UBS Group decreased their target price on shares of Danaher from $309.00 to $305.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Barclays decreased their target price on shares of Danaher from $275.00 to $240.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Raymond James reiterated a “market perform” rating on shares of Danaher in a research report on Monday, February 3rd. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on shares of Danaher from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Finally, Citigroup decreased their target price on shares of Danaher from $285.00 to $265.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Danaher has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $278.00.

Danaher Price Performance

Shares of NYSE DHR opened at $201.15 on Wednesday. Danaher Co. has a 1 year low of $199.75 and a 1 year high of $281.70. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31, a current ratio of 1.40 and a quick ratio of 1.05. The company’s 50-day moving average is $231.96 and its 200 day moving average is $251.14. The stock has a market capitalization of $145.29 billion, a P/E ratio of 38.10, a P/E/G ratio of 2.68 and a beta of 0.83.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The conglomerate reported $2.14 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $2.14. Danaher had a net margin of 16.33% and a return on equity of 10.82%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $2.09 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Danaher Co. will post 7.67 earnings per share for the current year.

Danaher Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 31st. Investors of record on Friday, December 27th were given a dividend of $0.27 per share. This represents a $1.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.54%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, December 27th. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio is currently 20.45%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Danaher news, SVP Brian W. Ellis sold 5,700 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $224.13, for a total value of $1,277,541.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 20,230 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,534,149.90. This represents a 21.98 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Corporate insiders own 11.10% of the company’s stock.

Danaher Profile

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.