Stock Repurchase Plan Declared by Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO) Board

Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO) declared that its board has initiated a share buyback program on Monday, April 7th, RTT News reports. The company plans to buyback $10.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the semiconductor manufacturer to buy up to 1.4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are typically an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Broadcom Trading Up 5.4 %

Shares of Broadcom stock traded up $7.85 during mid-day trading on Monday, hitting $154.14. 68,323,629 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 30,822,869. The stock has a market capitalization of $724.76 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 125.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.29 and a beta of 1.05. Broadcom has a twelve month low of $119.76 and a twelve month high of $251.88. The company has a current ratio of 1.17, a quick ratio of 1.07 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.98. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $200.61 and a 200 day simple moving average of $196.34.

Broadcom Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 31st. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 20th were issued a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 20th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.53%. Broadcom’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 113.46%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have commented on AVGO. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on Broadcom from $195.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Susquehanna upped their price target on Broadcom from $200.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Citigroup increased their price target on Broadcom from $175.00 to $205.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 10th. KeyCorp boosted their price objective on shares of Broadcom from $260.00 to $275.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, March 7th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on shares of Broadcom from $190.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-five have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $231.48.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Henry Samueli sold 663,976 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $181.60, for a total transaction of $120,578,041.60. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 38,798,721 shares in the company, valued at $7,045,847,733.60. This represents a 1.68 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, Director Eddy W. Hartenstein sold 4,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, January 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $229.64, for a total transaction of $918,560.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 46,400 shares in the company, valued at $10,655,296. This represents a 7.94 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 697,976 shares of company stock valued at $127,336,102 in the last quarter. 2.00% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

About Broadcom

Broadcom Inc designs, develops, and supplies various semiconductor devices with a focus on complex digital and mixed signal complementary metal oxide semiconductor based devices and analog III-V based products worldwide. The company operates in two segments, Semiconductor Solutions and Infrastructure Software.