HighTower Advisors LLC Trims Stake in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

HighTower Advisors LLC trimmed its holdings in shares of Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) by 50.9% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 18,411 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 19,061 shares during the period. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Celanese were worth $1,274,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Advisors Asset Management Inc. increased its holdings in Celanese by 10.6% in the 3rd quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 9,654 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,313,000 after buying an additional 927 shares in the last quarter. Cerity Partners LLC raised its stake in Celanese by 45.9% during the 3rd quarter. Cerity Partners LLC now owns 15,612 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $2,123,000 after buying an additional 4,908 shares during the last quarter. Pitcairn Co. lifted its holdings in Celanese by 18.1% in the third quarter. Pitcairn Co. now owns 2,968 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $404,000 after acquiring an additional 454 shares during the period. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Celanese by 12.7% in the 3rd quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 13,306 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,809,000 after purchasing an additional 1,500 shares during the period. Finally, Bank of Montreal Can raised its position in Celanese by 1.3% in the third quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 107,322 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $14,949,000 after acquiring an additional 1,361 shares during the period. 98.87% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages have weighed in on CE. Morgan Stanley lowered their price target on shares of Celanese from $100.00 to $80.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, January 13th. Piper Sandler decreased their price objective on Celanese from $77.00 to $50.00 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, February 25th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price target on shares of Celanese from $92.00 to $54.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 20th. Alembic Global Advisors upgraded shares of Celanese from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $70.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Monday, March 17th. Finally, Mizuho reduced their target price on shares of Celanese from $120.00 to $86.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 5th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $66.67.

Celanese Stock Performance

Shares of Celanese stock opened at $59.14 on Wednesday. Celanese Co. has a 52 week low of $45.94 and a 52 week high of $172.16. The company has a market capitalization of $6.47 billion, a PE ratio of -4.25, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.05 and a beta of 1.23. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $62.68 and its two-hundred day moving average is $85.82. The company has a quick ratio of 0.76, a current ratio of 1.34 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.98.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 18th. The basic materials company reported $1.45 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.25 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $2.37 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.36 billion. Celanese had a negative net margin of 14.81% and a positive return on equity of 12.86%. As a group, analysts expect that Celanese Co. will post 8.79 earnings per share for the current year.

Celanese Cuts Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, March 11th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 25th were issued a dividend of $0.03 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 25th. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.20%. Celanese’s payout ratio is currently -0.86%.

Celanese Company Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.