Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) Short Interest Update

Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) saw a large increase in short interest during the month of October. As of October 15th, there was short interest totalling 2,300,000 shares, an increase of 5.5% from the September 30th total of 2,180,000 shares. Currently, 3.4% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 291,100 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 7.9 days.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have commented on CATY shares. Piper Sandler increased their price objective on shares of Cathay General Bancorp from $32.00 to $36.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Wedbush increased their price objective on shares of Cathay General Bancorp from $50.00 to $52.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Truist Financial increased their price objective on shares of Cathay General Bancorp from $45.00 to $47.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of Cathay General Bancorp from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, July 19th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Cathay General Bancorp presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $44.00.

Insider Buying and Selling at Cathay General Bancorp

In other Cathay General Bancorp news, Chairman Dunson K. Cheng sold 12,401 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $44.79, for a total value of $555,440.79. Following the sale, the chairman now directly owns 149,566 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,699,061.14. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this link. Insiders own 4.76% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Quarry LP grew its position in Cathay General Bancorp by 76.3% during the 2nd quarter. Quarry LP now owns 765 shares of the bank’s stock worth $29,000 after purchasing an additional 331 shares during the last quarter. Quest Partners LLC purchased a new position in Cathay General Bancorp during the 2nd quarter worth $40,000. CWM LLC grew its position in Cathay General Bancorp by 168.6% during the 2nd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 1,265 shares of the bank’s stock worth $48,000 after purchasing an additional 794 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its position in Cathay General Bancorp by 24.9% during the 3rd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,531 shares of the bank’s stock worth $66,000 after purchasing an additional 305 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Bessemer Group Inc. grew its position in Cathay General Bancorp by 16.6% during the 1st quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 3,675 shares of the bank’s stock worth $139,000 after purchasing an additional 523 shares during the last quarter. 75.01% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Cathay General Bancorp Trading Up 0.9 %

NASDAQ CATY opened at $46.72 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11, a current ratio of 1.03 and a quick ratio of 1.03. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $43.57 and its 200 day moving average price is $40.06. The company has a market capitalization of $3.40 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.34 and a beta of 1.11. Cathay General Bancorp has a 12 month low of $33.55 and a 12 month high of $47.65.

Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) last posted its earnings results on Monday, October 21st. The bank reported $0.94 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.95 by ($0.01). The company had revenue of $359.86 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $182.70 million. Cathay General Bancorp had a net margin of 22.08% and a return on equity of 11.96%. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.13 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Cathay General Bancorp will post 4.02 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cathay General Bancorp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 9th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, August 29th were given a dividend of $0.34 per share. This represents a $1.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.91%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, August 29th. Cathay General Bancorp’s payout ratio is currently 30.09%.

About Cathay General Bancorp

Cathay General Bancorp operates as the holding company for Cathay Bank that offers various commercial banking products and services to individuals, professionals, and small to medium-sized businesses in the United States. The company offers various deposit products, including passbook accounts, checking accounts, money market deposit accounts, certificates of deposit, individual retirement accounts, and public funds deposits.