Franklin Resources Inc. Has $375,000 Stock Position in WaFd, Inc (NASDAQ:WAFD)

Franklin Resources Inc. cut its holdings in shares of WaFd, Inc (NASDAQ:WAFD) by 56.0% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 11,638 shares of the bank’s stock after selling 14,825 shares during the quarter. Franklin Resources Inc.’s holdings in WaFd were worth $375,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of WAFD. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA boosted its stake in WaFd by 24.2% in the fourth quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA now owns 11,249 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $363,000 after acquiring an additional 2,195 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of WaFd in the 4th quarter valued at $6,539,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its position in shares of WaFd by 152.9% in the 4th quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 469,704 shares of the bank’s stock worth $15,143,000 after purchasing an additional 283,953 shares during the last quarter. EntryPoint Capital LLC acquired a new stake in shares of WaFd during the fourth quarter worth $403,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in WaFd by 1.8% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 9,420,004 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $303,701,000 after purchasing an additional 166,931 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 83.71% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

WAFD has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Piper Sandler reduced their target price on WaFd from $37.00 to $31.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reduced their price objective on shares of WaFd from $32.00 to $30.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday. DA Davidson downgraded shares of WaFd from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and lowered their target price for the company from $35.00 to $32.00 in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. Stephens reissued an “equal weight” rating and set a $29.00 price target on shares of WaFd in a research report on Monday. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of WaFd from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, April 12th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $30.50.

WaFd Price Performance

NASDAQ WAFD opened at $28.03 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.05, a quick ratio of 1.04 and a current ratio of 1.04. The stock has a market cap of $2.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.92 and a beta of 0.79. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $28.18 and a 200 day simple moving average of $31.85. WaFd, Inc has a 52-week low of $23.75 and a 52-week high of $38.62.

WaFd (NASDAQ:WAFD) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Friday, April 11th. The bank reported $0.65 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.60 by $0.05. WaFd had a net margin of 12.66% and a return on equity of 8.78%. The company had revenue of $179.79 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $184.17 million. Analysts anticipate that WaFd, Inc will post 2.56 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

WaFd Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 7th. Shareholders of record on Friday, February 21st were issued a dividend of $0.27 per share. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.85%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, February 21st. This is a boost from WaFd’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. WaFd’s dividend payout ratio is 40.75%.

WaFd Profile

WaFd, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Washington Federal Bank that provides lending, depository, insurance, and other banking services in the United States. The company offers deposit products, including business and personal checking accounts, and term certificates of deposit, as well as money market accounts and passbook savings accounts.