Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) Downgraded by StockNews.com to “Hold”

StockNews.com lowered shares of Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note released on Friday morning.

GRMN has been the topic of several other research reports. Bank of America downgraded Garmin from a neutral rating to an underperform rating and decreased their price objective for the stock from $165.00 to $150.00 in a research note on Wednesday, May 22nd. Tigress Financial raised their target price on shares of Garmin from $175.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock a strong-buy rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 14th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Garmin presently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $156.83.

Garmin Trading Down 0.4 %

Shares of NYSE GRMN opened at $180.09 on Friday. Garmin has a 12-month low of $99.61 and a 12-month high of $183.88. The firm has a market capitalization of $34.59 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 0.98. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $171.90 and a 200 day moving average of $159.47.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 31st. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $1.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.40 by $0.18. Garmin had a net margin of 24.36% and a return on equity of 17.09%. The firm had revenue of $1.51 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.42 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.45 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that Garmin will post 6.05 EPS for the current year.

Garmin Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 28th. Investors of record on Friday, March 14th will be paid a dividend of $0.75 per share. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.67%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 14th. Garmin’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 42.31%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Philip Straub sold 2,750 shares of Garmin stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $181.46, for a total transaction of $499,015.00. Following the sale, the director now owns 88,622 shares in the company, valued at $16,081,348.12. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. In other news, Director Philip Straub sold 2,750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, August 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $181.46, for a total transaction of $499,015.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 88,622 shares in the company, valued at $16,081,348.12. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CFO Douglas G. Boessen sold 2,350 shares of Garmin stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $161.63, for a total value of $379,830.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 28,010 shares in the company, valued at $4,527,256.30. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 15,242 shares of company stock worth $2,676,004 in the last three months. 19.54% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Garmin

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Clearstead Trust LLC bought a new stake in Garmin during the first quarter worth approximately $30,000. Frazier Financial Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Garmin during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $33,000. Family Firm Inc. bought a new position in shares of Garmin during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $35,000. Benjamin Edwards Inc. raised its holdings in Garmin by 73.3% during the 2nd quarter. Benjamin Edwards Inc. now owns 234 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $38,000 after buying an additional 99 shares during the period. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC bought a new stake in Garmin in the second quarter worth $46,000. 73.41% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Garmin

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.