California Public Employees Retirement System Reduces Stock Holdings in Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD)

California Public Employees Retirement System reduced its stake in Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD) by 7.4% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 308,121 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 24,557 shares during the period. California Public Employees Retirement System owned 0.19% of Steel Dynamics worth $36,389,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in STLD. Ameriprise Financial Inc. increased its stake in Steel Dynamics by 165.4% in the third quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 2,014,956 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $212,447,000 after purchasing an additional 1,255,751 shares during the last quarter. Assetmark Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Steel Dynamics by 105.7% in the third quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 789,836 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $84,686,000 after acquiring an additional 405,836 shares during the period. Sapient Capital LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Steel Dynamics in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $38,644,000. Nordea Investment Management AB boosted its holdings in shares of Steel Dynamics by 29.0% in the third quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 997,827 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $106,139,000 after acquiring an additional 224,226 shares during the period. Finally, ING Groep NV boosted its holdings in shares of Steel Dynamics by 832.8% in the third quarter. ING Groep NV now owns 213,975 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $22,942,000 after acquiring an additional 191,036 shares during the period. 82.41% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently weighed in on STLD. UBS Group decreased their price objective on Steel Dynamics from $120.00 to $119.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 24th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price objective on Steel Dynamics from $110.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Monday, March 18th. Citigroup increased their price objective on Steel Dynamics from $130.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 13th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on Steel Dynamics from $100.00 to $118.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 16th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $121.17.

Steel Dynamics Trading Up 0.8 %

NASDAQ:STLD opened at $134.04 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $137.39 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $122.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $21.17 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 9.21 and a beta of 1.42. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.29, a quick ratio of 1.67 and a current ratio of 2.87. Steel Dynamics, Inc. has a 1 year low of $90.55 and a 1 year high of $151.34.

Steel Dynamics (NASDAQ:STLD) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 23rd. The basic materials company reported $3.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.54 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $4.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.74 billion. Steel Dynamics had a return on equity of 27.62% and a net margin of 12.89%. Steel Dynamics’s revenue was down 4.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $4.01 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Steel Dynamics, Inc. will post 11.79 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Steel Dynamics Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Sunday, April 14th. Stockholders of record on Sunday, March 31st were given a $0.46 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, March 27th. This represents a $1.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.37%. This is a boost from Steel Dynamics’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.43. Steel Dynamics’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 12.64%.

About Steel Dynamics

Steel Dynamics, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a steel producer and metal recycler in the United States. The Steel Operations segment offers hot rolled, cold rolled, and coated steel products; parallel flange beams and channel sections, flat bars, large unequal leg angles, and reinforcing steel bars, as well as standard strength carbon, intermediate alloy hardness, and premium grade rail products; engineered special-bar-quality products, merchant-bar-quality products, and other engineered round steel bars; channels, angles, flats, merchant rounds, and reinforcing steel bars; and specialty shapes and light structural steel products.