Bank of America Has Lowered Expectations for General Mills (NYSE:GIS) Stock Price

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) had its price target lowered by Bank of America from $70.00 to $68.00 in a research report released on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has a buy rating on the stock.

Several other research analysts have also issued reports on GIS. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their target price on shares of General Mills from $83.00 to $82.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. TD Cowen cut their target price on shares of General Mills from $75.00 to $64.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Wells Fargo & Company cut their target price on shares of General Mills from $64.00 to $61.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 19th. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed a “sector perform” rating and issued a $70.00 price objective on shares of General Mills in a research note on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Mizuho dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $72.00 to $65.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, February 10th. Twelve analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $66.53.

General Mills Trading Up 0.8 %

GIS opened at $58.78 on Thursday. General Mills has a twelve month low of $55.15 and a twelve month high of $75.90. The company has a quick ratio of 0.67, a current ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32. The company has a fifty day moving average of $60.00 and a 200-day moving average of $65.23. The stock has a market cap of $32.40 billion, a PE ratio of 12.78, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.94 and a beta of 0.06.

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, March 19th. The company reported $1.00 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.96 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $4.84 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.99 billion. General Mills had a net margin of 13.08% and a return on equity of 27.55%. General Mills’s revenue was down 5.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.17 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts predict that General Mills will post 4.36 EPS for the current year.

General Mills Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be issued a $0.60 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $2.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.08%. General Mills’s dividend payout ratio is currently 52.75%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Jeffrey L. Harmening sold 11,379 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $65.00, for a total value of $739,635.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 353,346 shares in the company, valued at $22,967,490. This represents a 3.12 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 0.26% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of General Mills

A number of large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in General Mills by 2.8% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 68,630,598 shares of the company’s stock worth $4,376,573,000 after buying an additional 1,868,508 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its holdings in General Mills by 9.4% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 33,502,737 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,474,177,000 after buying an additional 2,867,678 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in General Mills by 1.0% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 14,488,451 shares of the company’s stock worth $923,907,000 after buying an additional 136,895 shares during the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. increased its holdings in General Mills by 34.5% during the fourth quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 9,123,387 shares of the company’s stock worth $581,903,000 after buying an additional 2,341,137 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp increased its holdings in General Mills by 18.4% during the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 8,061,793 shares of the company’s stock worth $514,101,000 after buying an additional 1,253,483 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.71% of the company’s stock.

General Mills Company Profile

General Mills, Inc manufactures and markets branded consumer foods worldwide. The company operates through four segments: North America Retail; International; Pet; and North America Foodservice. It offers grain, ready-to-eat cereals, refrigerated yogurt, soup, meal kits, refrigerated and frozen dough products, dessert and baking mixes, bakery flour, frozen pizza and pizza snacks, snack bars, fruit and savory snacks, ice cream and frozen desserts, unbaked and fully baked frozen dough products, frozen hot snacks, ethnic meals, side dish mixes, frozen breakfast and entrees, nutrition bars, and frozen and shelf-stable vegetables.