Warner Music Group Corp. (NASDAQ:WMG) Receives $35.47 Consensus Target Price from Brokerages

Shares of Warner Music Group Corp. (NASDAQ:WMG) have been given a consensus rating of “Hold” by the seventeen brokerages that are covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, six have given a hold recommendation and nine have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1 year price target among brokers that have covered the stock in the last year is $34.88.

Several research firms have recently issued reports on WMG. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of Warner Music Group from $41.00 to $38.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Guggenheim reduced their price objective on shares of Warner Music Group from $40.00 to $37.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Citigroup upgraded shares of Warner Music Group from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $34.00 to $42.00 in a research report on Friday, February 14th. FBN Securities started coverage on shares of Warner Music Group in a research report on Friday, March 28th. They set a “sector perform” rating and a $35.00 price objective on the stock. Finally, Barclays cut their target price on shares of Warner Music Group from $31.00 to $28.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday.

Warner Music Group Price Performance

NASDAQ WMG opened at $27.31 on Friday. Warner Music Group has a 12 month low of $26.34 and a 12 month high of $36.64. The stock has a market cap of $14.21 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.87, a PEG ratio of 1.03 and a beta of 1.32. The company’s 50 day moving average is $30.70 and its two-hundred day moving average is $31.68. The company has a current ratio of 0.69, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.67.

Warner Music Group (NASDAQ:WMG) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 8th. The company reported $0.07 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.28 by ($0.21). The company had revenue of $1.48 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.52 billion. Warner Music Group had a net margin of 8.07% and a return on equity of 79.01%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down .7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.18 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Warner Music Group will post 1.39 earnings per share for the current year.

Warner Music Group Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, March 4th. Shareholders of record on Monday, February 24th were paid a dividend of $0.18 per share. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.64%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, February 24th. Warner Music Group’s payout ratio is 82.76%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Timothy Matusch sold 1,103 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, February 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.49, for a total transaction of $40,248.47. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 88,649 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,234,802.01. The trade was a 1.23% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director Valentin Blavatnik sold 28,230 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $35.45, for a total transaction of $1,000,753.50. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 68,264 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,419,958.80. This represents a 29.26% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 30,333 shares of company stock valued at $1,072,432 over the last three months. 72.21% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Warner Music Group

A number of large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Warner Music Group by 10.1% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 14,379,667 shares of the company’s stock valued at $450,803,000 after purchasing an additional 1,316,979 shares during the period. Capital World Investors raised its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 13,371,100 shares of the company’s stock valued at $414,504,000 after acquiring an additional 82,149 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 27.9% in the fourth quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 11,199,012 shares of the company’s stock valued at $347,169,000 after acquiring an additional 2,444,508 shares in the last quarter. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP raised its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 16.9% in the fourth quarter. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP now owns 10,370,280 shares of the company’s stock valued at $321,479,000 after acquiring an additional 1,500,000 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC raised its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 43.5% in the fourth quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 7,920,342 shares of the company’s stock valued at $245,531,000 after acquiring an additional 2,400,500 shares in the last quarter. 96.88% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Warner Music Group Company Profile

Warner Music Group Corp. operates as a music entertainment company in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and internationally. It operates through Recorded Music and Music Publishing segments. The Recorded Music segment is involved in the discovery and development of recording artists, as well as related marketing, promotion, distribution, sale, and licensing of music created by such recording artists; markets its music catalog through compilations and reissuances of previously released music and video titles, as well as previously unreleased materials; and conducts its operation primarily through a collection of record labels, such as Warner Records and Atlantic Records, as well as Asylum, Big Beat, Canvasback, East West, Erato, FFRR, Fueled by Ramen, Nonesuch, Parlophone, Reprise, Roadrunner, Sire, Spinnin’ Records, Warner Classics, and Warner Music Nashville.