Brokerages Set Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE:BRO) Price Target at $91.70

Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE:BRO) has earned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the ten analysts that are currently covering the company, Marketbeat Ratings reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating on the company. The average 1 year price objective among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $91.70.

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on BRO shares. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $84.00 to $85.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 24th. StockNews.com lowered shares of Brown & Brown from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, July 18th. Raymond James increased their price objective on shares of Brown & Brown from $90.00 to $95.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. UBS Group increased their price objective on shares of Brown & Brown from $91.00 to $94.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods increased their price objective on shares of Brown & Brown from $80.00 to $82.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a research report on Friday, May 3rd.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Brown & Brown news, EVP Julie Turpin sold 3,350 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $89.92, for a total transaction of $301,232.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 23,597 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,121,842.24. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 17.02% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Brown & Brown

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in BRO. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Brown & Brown in the 4th quarter worth $217,663,000. Congress Asset Management Co. MA acquired a new stake in shares of Brown & Brown in the 4th quarter worth $82,445,000. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company lifted its stake in shares of Brown & Brown by 76.2% in the 4th quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 2,000,227 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $142,236,000 after acquiring an additional 865,082 shares during the period. Confluence Investment Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Brown & Brown in the 1st quarter worth $49,598,000. Finally, Allianz Asset Management GmbH lifted its stake in shares of Brown & Brown by 339.1% in the 4th quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 648,550 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $46,118,000 after acquiring an additional 500,847 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.01% of the company’s stock.

Brown & Brown Stock Performance

Shares of BRO stock opened at $93.16 on Thursday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $90.56 and its 200-day moving average price is $84.89. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52, a quick ratio of 1.97 and a current ratio of 1.97. Brown & Brown has a one year low of $66.73 and a one year high of $94.28. The firm has a market cap of $26.57 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.66, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 0.82.

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Monday, July 22nd. The financial services provider reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.88 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $1.18 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.14 billion. Brown & Brown had a net margin of 21.09% and a return on equity of 16.43%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.68 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Brown & Brown will post 3.61 EPS for the current year.

Brown & Brown Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, August 14th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, August 7th will be given a dividend of $0.13 per share. This represents a $0.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.56%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, August 7th. Brown & Brown’s payout ratio is currently 16.00%.

Brown & Brown Company Profile

Brown & Brown, Inc markets and sells insurance products and services in the United States, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through four segments: Retail, National Programs, Wholesale Brokerage, and Services. The Retail segment provides property and casualty, employee benefits insurance products, personal insurance products, specialties insurance products, risk management strategies, loss control survey and analysis, consultancy, and claims processing services.