Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) Position Increased by Lafayette Investments Inc.

Lafayette Investments Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) by 18.3% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 3,081 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 476 shares during the quarter. Lafayette Investments Inc.’s holdings in Veralto were worth $314,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the business. PEAK6 Investments LLC boosted its holdings in Veralto by 246.3% in the third quarter. PEAK6 Investments LLC now owns 8,733 shares of the company’s stock worth $977,000 after purchasing an additional 6,211 shares in the last quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB boosted its holdings in Veralto by 34.6% in the 4th quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 3,923,747 shares of the company’s stock valued at $400,928,000 after purchasing an additional 1,009,170 shares during the period. Park Avenue Securities LLC grew its position in 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 buying an additional 2,676 shares in the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company grew its holdings in shares of Veralto by 10.2% during the 3rd quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 163,227 shares of the company’s stock worth $18,259,000 after purchasing an additional 15,048 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Czech National Bank increased its holdings in Veralto by 6.5% in the 4th quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 53,622 shares of the company’s stock valued at $5,461,000 after buying an additional 3,284 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.28% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Citigroup dropped their target price on Veralto from $118.00 to $116.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 13th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on shares of Veralto from $116.00 to $110.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price objective on 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 began coverage on shares of Veralto in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. They set a “buy” rating and a $125.00 target price for the company. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Veralto currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $113.50.

Veralto Trading Up 2.4 %

NYSE VLTO opened at $98.05 on Friday. Veralto Co. has a 52 week low of $85.90 and a 52 week high of $115.00. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $100.28 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $104.91. The stock has a market capitalization of $24.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.36, a PEG ratio of 4.24 and a beta of 1.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a quick ratio of 1.69 and a current ratio of 1.92.

Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate 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, analysts anticipate that Veralto Co. will post 3.66 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Veralto Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 30th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 31st will be issued a dividend of $0.11 per share. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.45%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 31st. Veralto’s dividend payout ratio is presently 13.17%.

Insider Activity

In related news, SVP Surekha Trivedi sold 590 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $100.35, for a total value of $59,206.50. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 8,470 shares in the company, valued at approximately $849,964.50. The trade was a 6.51 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, SVP Melissa Aquino sold 463 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $99.60, for a total value of $46,114.80. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 20,761 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,067,795.60. The trade was a 2.18 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 11,467 shares of company stock valued at $1,150,366. 0.31% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Veralto 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.