Sei Investments Co. Buys 1,333,242 Shares of Lam Research Co. (NASDAQ:LRCX)

Sei Investments Co. lifted its stake in shares of Lam Research Co. (NASDAQ:LRCX) by 879.7% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,484,793 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,333,242 shares during the quarter. Sei Investments Co. owned 0.12% of Lam Research worth $107,244,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. American Century Companies Inc. raised its stake in shares of Lam Research by 1,093.5% during the 4th quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,306,829 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $94,392,000 after purchasing an additional 1,197,337 shares during the period. Runnymede Capital Advisors Inc. bought a new position in Lam Research in the 4th quarter worth about $1,643,000. Mizuho Securities USA LLC increased its stake in Lam Research by 1,342.5% in the 4th quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC now owns 121,949 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $8,808,000 after acquiring an additional 113,495 shares during the last quarter. Quantbot Technologies LP increased its stake in Lam Research by 8,308.7% in the 4th quarter. Quantbot Technologies LP now owns 236,622 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $17,091,000 after acquiring an additional 233,808 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sciencast Management LP bought a new position in Lam Research in the 4th quarter worth about $2,995,000. 84.61% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have weighed in on LRCX. Sanford C. Bernstein upgraded Lam Research from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their target price for the stock from $85.00 to $91.00 in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Oppenheimer began coverage on Lam Research in a research note on Thursday. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $95.00 target price on the stock. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on Lam Research from $76.00 to $78.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 5th. KeyCorp upgraded Lam Research from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $95.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 17th. Finally, Wolfe Research lowered Lam Research from an “outperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 15th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eighteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $98.06.

Lam Research Trading Down 2.2 %

NASDAQ LRCX opened at $75.84 on Friday. Lam Research Co. has a fifty-two week low of $68.87 and a fifty-two week high of $113.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51, a quick ratio of 1.73 and a current ratio of 2.54. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $79.62 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $77.28. The stock has a market cap of $97.35 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.04, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.47 and a beta of 1.53.

Lam Research (NASDAQ:LRCX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The semiconductor company reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.04. Lam Research had a return on equity of 51.86% and a net margin of 26.49%. On average, analysts forecast that Lam Research Co. will post 3.71 earnings per share for the current year.

Lam Research Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 9th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, March 5th will be paid a $0.23 dividend. This represents a $0.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.21%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, March 5th. Lam Research’s payout ratio is presently 27.96%.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Seshasayee Varadarajan sold 110,080 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $90.00, for a total value of $9,907,200.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 179,084 shares in the company, valued at $16,117,560. This trade represents a 38.07 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. 0.29% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Lam Research Profile

Lam Research Corporation designs, manufactures, markets, refurbishes, and services semiconductor processing equipment used in the fabrication of integrated circuits. The company offers ALTUS systems to deposit conformal films for tungsten metallization applications; SABRE electrochemical deposition products for copper interconnect transition that offers copper damascene manufacturing; SOLA ultraviolet thermal processing products for film treatments; and VECTOR plasma-enhanced CVD ALD products.