Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) Shares Sold by New York State Teachers Retirement System

New York State Teachers Retirement System lessened its stake in Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) by 7.7% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 242,901 shares of the company’s stock after selling 20,236 shares during the period. New York State Teachers Retirement System owned 0.08% of Ball worth $13,391,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. First Merchants Corp increased its position in Ball by 1,335.8% during the 4th quarter. First Merchants Corp now owns 619,205 shares of the company’s stock worth $34,137,000 after purchasing an additional 576,078 shares during the period. Van ECK Associates Corp increased its position in Ball by 3,599.7% during the 4th quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 317,321 shares of the company’s stock worth $17,494,000 after purchasing an additional 308,744 shares during the period. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC increased its position in Ball by 10.0% during the 4th quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC now owns 17,135 shares of the company’s stock worth $933,000 after purchasing an additional 1,559 shares during the period. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA increased its position in Ball by 531,933.3% during the 4th quarter. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA now owns 47,883 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,707,000 after purchasing an additional 47,874 shares during the period. Finally, Empowered Funds LLC increased its position in Ball by 10.9% during the 4th quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 5,577 shares of the company’s stock worth $307,000 after purchasing an additional 546 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 86.51% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have issued reports on the company. Barclays dropped their target price on Ball from $72.00 to $61.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Citigroup decreased their price target on Ball from $69.00 to $59.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, January 6th. UBS Group decreased their price target on Ball from $60.00 to $55.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 13th. Mizuho raised Ball from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $67.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Finally, Morgan Stanley decreased their price target on Ball from $75.00 to $70.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $65.25.

Ball Price Performance

BALL stock opened at $49.90 on Tuesday. Ball Co. has a 1 year low of $49.00 and a 1 year high of $71.32. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.90, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 1.00. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $54.34 and its 200 day moving average price is $60.34. The firm has a market cap of $14.89 billion, a P/E ratio of 3.94, a PEG ratio of 1.22 and a beta of 0.94.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.84 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.81 by $0.03. Ball had a return on equity of 16.17% and a net margin of 33.98%. The firm had revenue of $2.88 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.92 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.78 EPS. Ball’s revenue was down .8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Ball Co. will post 3.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase program on Wednesday, January 29th that allows the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the company to buy up to 24.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are often an indication that the company’s leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

Ball Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 17th. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 3rd will be paid a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.60%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 3rd. Ball’s dividend payout ratio is presently 6.32%.

Ball Company Profile

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.