W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) has earned an average rating of “Moderate Buy” from the nine research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and five have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month target price among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $89.22.

Several equities analysts have issued reports on WRB shares. BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on shares of W. R. Berkley from $71.00 to $81.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. StockNews.com lowered shares of W. R. Berkley from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 11th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their price objective on shares of W. R. Berkley from $85.00 to $88.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th. UBS Group lifted their price objective on shares of W. R. Berkley from $81.00 to $93.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 30th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on shares of W. R. Berkley from $92.00 to $99.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On W. R. Berkley

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in WRB. Morgan Stanley boosted its position in W. R. Berkley by 427.2% during the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 10,899,093 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $790,947,000 after buying an additional 8,831,553 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 55.3% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 24,331,473 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $1,620,232,000 after purchasing an additional 8,664,707 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 65.6% in the 1st quarter. State Street Corp now owns 11,940,770 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $795,136,000 after purchasing an additional 4,732,333 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of W. R. Berkley in the 4th quarter worth about $213,635,000. Finally, Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 119.7% in the 1st quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,377,556 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $224,911,000 after purchasing an additional 1,840,475 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 68.82% of the company’s stock.

W. R. Berkley Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:WRB opened at $82.40 on Friday. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $84.53 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $75.78. W. R. Berkley has a 12-month low of $55.50 and a 12-month high of $89.18. The company has a quick ratio of 0.37, a current ratio of 0.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.38. The firm has a market cap of $21.14 billion, a PE ratio of 16.28, a PEG ratio of 1.51 and a beta of 0.57.

W. R. Berkley (NYSE:WRB) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 24th. The insurance provider reported $1.45 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.35 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $3.22 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.70 billion. W. R. Berkley had a net margin of 11.38% and a return on equity of 19.03%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 6.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.16 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that W. R. Berkley will post 5.94 earnings per share for the current year.

W. R. Berkley Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 4th were issued a $0.11 dividend. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.53%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, March 1st. W. R. Berkley’s payout ratio is 8.70%.

About W. R. Berkley

W. R. Berkley Corporation, an insurance holding company, operates as a commercial lines writers worldwide. It operates in two segments, Insurance and Reinsurance & Monoline Excess. The Insurance segment underwrites commercial insurance business, including excess and surplus lines, admitted lines, and specialty personal lines.