Ipswich Investment Management Co. Inc. Has $385,000 Stake in Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO)

Ipswich Investment Management Co. Inc. reduced its stake in Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) by 4.0% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 3,781 shares of the company’s stock after selling 156 shares during the quarter. Ipswich Investment Management Co. Inc.’s holdings in Veralto were worth $385,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of VLTO. PEAK6 Investments LLC increased its position in shares of Veralto by 246.3% during the third quarter. PEAK6 Investments LLC now owns 8,733 shares of the company’s stock worth $977,000 after acquiring an additional 6,211 shares in the last quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB increased its position in shares of Veralto by 34.6% during the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 3,923,747 shares of the company’s stock worth $400,928,000 after acquiring an additional 1,009,170 shares in the last quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC increased its position in shares of Veralto by 18.4% during the fourth quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC now owns 17,228 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,755,000 after acquiring an additional 2,676 shares in the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its position in shares of Veralto by 10.2% during the third quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 163,227 shares of the company’s stock worth $18,259,000 after acquiring an additional 15,048 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Czech National Bank increased its position in shares of Veralto by 6.5% during the fourth quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 53,622 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,461,000 after acquiring an additional 3,284 shares in the last quarter. 91.28% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently commented on VLTO. Citigroup decreased their target price on shares of Veralto from $118.00 to $116.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their target price on shares of Veralto from $116.00 to $110.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on shares of Veralto from $111.00 to $110.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group assumed coverage on shares of Veralto in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $125.00 price objective for the company. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Veralto presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $112.55.

Veralto Stock Up 0.5 %

VLTO opened at $98.21 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.69, a current ratio of 1.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27. The stock has a market cap of $24.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.41, a PEG ratio of 4.24 and a beta of 1.06. Veralto Co. has a twelve month low of $85.70 and a twelve month high of $115.00. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $101.54 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $105.93.

Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.90 by $0.05. Veralto had a net margin of 16.04% and a return on equity of 49.29%. As a group, equities analysts expect that Veralto Co. will post 3.66 earnings per share for the current year.

Veralto Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 31st. Investors of record on Tuesday, December 31st were paid a dividend of $0.11 per share. This is a boost from Veralto’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.09. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.45%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, December 31st. Veralto’s dividend payout ratio is presently 13.17%.

Insider Activity at Veralto

In related news, SVP Melissa Aquino sold 463 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $99.60, for a total transaction of $46,114.80. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 20,761 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,067,795.60. This represents a 2.18 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. 0.31% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Veralto Company Profile

Veralto Corporation provides water analytics, water treatment, marking and coding, and packaging and color services worldwide. It operates through two segments, Water Quality (WQ) and Product Quality & Innovation (PQI). The WQ segment offers precision instrumentation and water treatment technologies to measure, analyze, and treat water in residential, commercial, municipal, industrial, research, and natural resource applications through the Hach, Trojan Technologies, and ChemTreat brands.