Clearbridge Investments LLC Cuts Stock Holdings in Open Text Co. (NASDAQ:OTEX)

Clearbridge Investments LLC lessened its holdings in Open Text Co. (NASDAQ:OTEX) (TSE:OTC) by 2.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 2,833,612 shares of the software maker’s stock after selling 65,220 shares during the quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC’s holdings in Open Text were worth $80,248,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Open Text by 1.8% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 672,532 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $22,411,000 after buying an additional 11,965 shares during the period. Citigroup Inc. lifted its holdings in Open Text by 49.1% in the third quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 147,185 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $4,905,000 after acquiring an additional 48,496 shares during the period. Cerity Partners LLC boosted its position in shares of Open Text by 12.6% during the 3rd quarter. Cerity Partners LLC now owns 34,307 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $1,142,000 after purchasing an additional 3,844 shares in the last quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets grew its stake in shares of Open Text by 3.3% during the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 11,093 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $369,000 after purchasing an additional 351 shares during the period. Finally, Bridgewater Associates LP purchased a new position in shares of Open Text in the 3rd quarter valued at about $1,257,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.37% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently commented on OTEX shares. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of Open Text from $34.00 to $36.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. StockNews.com lowered Open Text from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 27th. UBS Group began coverage on Open Text in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $32.00 price objective for the company. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on Open Text from $33.00 to $31.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, February 7th. Finally, Citigroup raised their price target on Open Text from $30.00 to $32.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, February 7th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $35.18.

Open Text Stock Down 0.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ:OTEX opened at $25.26 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $6.64 billion, a P/E ratio of 10.27 and a beta of 1.17. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $27.33 and its 200-day simple moving average is $29.44. Open Text Co. has a 52-week low of $24.61 and a 52-week high of $39.00. The company has a quick ratio of 0.87, a current ratio of 0.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50.

Open Text (NASDAQ:OTEX) (TSE:OTC) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The software maker reported $1.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.92 by $0.10. Open Text had a net margin of 12.21% and a return on equity of 23.23%. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Open Text Co. will post 3.45 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Open Text Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 21st. Investors of record on Friday, March 7th were given a dividend of $0.2625 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, March 7th. This represents a $1.05 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.16%. This is a positive change from Open Text’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. Open Text’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 42.68%.

Open Text Company Profile

Open Text Corporation provides information management software and solutions. The company offers content services, which includes content collaboration and intelligent capture to records management, collaboration, e-signatures, and archiving; and operates experience cloud platform that provides customer experience and web content management, digital asset management, customer analytics, AI and insights, e-discovery, digital fax, omnichannel communications, secure messaging, and voice of customer, as well as customer journey, testing, and segmentation.