Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) Shares Sold by abrdn plc

abrdn plc decreased its stake in Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) by 3.4% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm owned 495,520 shares of the company’s stock after selling 17,700 shares during the quarter. abrdn plc’s holdings in Ball were worth $27,239,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Peterson Financial Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Ball in the third quarter worth about $30,000. Catalyst Capital Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Ball during the third quarter worth about $47,000. Brooklyn Investment Group purchased a new stake in shares of Ball in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $66,000. Farther Finance Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Ball by 29.1% in the 3rd quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 1,011 shares of the company’s stock valued at $69,000 after acquiring an additional 228 shares during the period. Finally, ORG Wealth Partners LLC raised its stake in shares of Ball by 298.9% in the 4th quarter. ORG Wealth Partners LLC now owns 1,428 shares of the company’s stock valued at $79,000 after acquiring an additional 1,070 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 86.51% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have issued reports on BALL. Mizuho upgraded shares of Ball from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $67.00 target price on the stock in a report on Tuesday, December 10th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued an “underweight” rating and issued a $49.00 price objective (down from $56.00) on shares of Ball in a research report on Thursday, January 16th. Citigroup dropped their target price on shares of Ball from $69.00 to $59.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Robert W. Baird decreased their price target on shares of Ball from $70.00 to $63.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, UBS Group upgraded shares of Ball from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their price target for the stock from $62.00 to $58.00 in a research note on Friday, January 10th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Ball has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $67.17.

Ball Stock Performance

NYSE:BALL opened at $51.12 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 1.09, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $56.21 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $61.14. Ball Co. has a twelve month low of $50.81 and a twelve month high of $71.32. The company has a market capitalization of $15.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 3.86, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.39 and a beta of 0.94.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.84 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.81 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $2.88 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.92 billion. Ball had a net margin of 34.05% and a return on equity of 17.46%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down .8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.78 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Ball Co. will post 3.15 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 17th. Investors of record on Monday, March 3rd will be issued a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 3rd. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.56%. Ball’s payout ratio is 6.03%.

Ball declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, January 29th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the company to purchase up to 24.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are usually an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Ball Company Profile

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.