Cwm LLC Lowers Stake in Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

Cwm LLC lowered its stake in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 37.8% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 30,773 shares of the asset manager’s stock after selling 18,670 shares during the period. Cwm LLC’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $4,029,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Marino Stram & Associates LLC lifted its position in shares of Blackstone by 3.8% during the 4th quarter. Marino Stram & Associates LLC now owns 2,592 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $339,000 after purchasing an additional 96 shares during the last quarter. Mayfair Advisory Group LLC lifted its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.7% during the 4th quarter. Mayfair Advisory Group LLC now owns 3,776 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $484,000 after purchasing an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Hartford Financial Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Blackstone by 23.0% during the 4th quarter. Hartford Financial Management Inc. now owns 534 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $70,000 after purchasing an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Bourgeon Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Blackstone by 86.2% during the 4th quarter. Bourgeon Capital Management LLC now owns 216 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $28,000 after purchasing an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Pinnacle Financial Partners Inc lifted its position in shares of Blackstone by 0.3% during the 4th quarter. Pinnacle Financial Partners Inc now owns 39,671 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $5,194,000 after purchasing an additional 102 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Blackstone news, major shareholder Bx Buzz Ml-1 Gp Llc sold 2,509,316 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Sunday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $11.10, for a total transaction of $27,853,407.60. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 12,802 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $142,102.20. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other Blackstone news, major shareholder Bx Buzz Ml-1 Gp Llc sold 2,509,316 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Sunday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $11.10, for a total transaction of $27,853,407.60. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 12,802 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $142,102.20. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, insider John G. Finley sold 49,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $127.93, for a total transaction of $6,268,570.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 393,143 shares in the company, valued at approximately $50,294,783.99. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 2,587,168 shares of company stock valued at $37,816,476 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on BX. TheStreet cut shares of Blackstone from a “b” rating to a “c+” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 25th. The Goldman Sachs Group cut shares of Blackstone from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their price target for the company from $115.00 to $128.00 in a research report on Wednesday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price target on shares of Blackstone from $127.00 to $130.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, January 22nd. JMP Securities restated a “market perform” rating on shares of Blackstone in a research note on Tuesday, April 9th. Finally, TD Cowen dropped their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $117.00 to $114.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, April 19th. Thirteen analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Blackstone presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $122.94.

Blackstone Stock Up 1.7 %

Shares of NYSE BX opened at $124.22 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 0.79 and a quick ratio of 0.80. The company has a market capitalization of $88.77 billion, a PE ratio of 43.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.98 and a beta of 1.51. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $126.30 and its two-hundred day moving average is $118.20. Blackstone Inc. has a 12-month low of $79.92 and a 12-month high of $133.56.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 18th. The asset manager reported $0.98 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.98. The business had revenue of $3.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.56 billion. Blackstone had a net margin of 20.84% and a return on equity of 17.33%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 166.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.97 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.82 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Cuts Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, May 6th. Investors of record on Monday, April 29th will be paid a dividend of $0.83 per share. This represents a $3.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.67%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, April 26th. Blackstone’s payout ratio is 132.86%.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.