Farringdon Capital Ltd. Purchases New Stake in News Co. (NASDAQ:NWSA)

Farringdon Capital Ltd. acquired a new position in shares of News Co. (NASDAQ:NWSA) in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund acquired 123,790 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,409,000. News makes up 1.4% of Farringdon Capital Ltd.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 4th largest position.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in NWSA. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in News by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 50,952,317 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,403,227,000 after acquiring an additional 632,721 shares in the last quarter. Independent Franchise Partners LLP raised its stake in shares of News by 11.8% during the fourth quarter. Independent Franchise Partners LLP now owns 26,617,259 shares of the company’s stock valued at $733,039,000 after purchasing an additional 2,812,080 shares during the period. Barclays PLC lifted its position in shares of News by 124.0% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 14,713,823 shares of the company’s stock worth $391,832,000 after purchasing an additional 8,144,856 shares in the last quarter. Dodge & Cox boosted its stake in shares of News by 12.0% in the fourth quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 11,662,685 shares of the company’s stock valued at $321,190,000 after purchasing an additional 1,245,278 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in News by 2.4% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 9,857,139 shares of the company’s stock worth $270,798,000 after buying an additional 234,893 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 66.97% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

NWSA has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Seaport Res Ptn raised shares of News to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. StockNews.com lowered News from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday. UBS Group raised News from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 4th. Loop Capital dropped their price target on shares of News from $44.00 to $41.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, December 23rd. Finally, Guggenheim increased their price objective on shares of News from $40.00 to $43.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 22nd. One analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, six have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $38.80.

News Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NWSA opened at $25.67 on Thursday. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $27.41 and a 200-day simple moving average of $27.71. News Co. has a twelve month low of $22.65 and a twelve month high of $30.69. The company has a market capitalization of $14.57 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.16 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a current ratio of 1.73, a quick ratio of 1.65 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22.

News (NASDAQ:NWSA) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 5th. The company reported $0.33 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.29 by $0.04. News had a net margin of 4.22% and a return on equity of 5.31%. As a group, equities research analysts expect that News Co. will post 0.94 earnings per share for the current year.

News Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, April 9th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, March 12th were issued a $0.10 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, March 12th. This represents a $0.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.56%. News’s dividend payout ratio is currently 27.40%.

News Profile

News Corporation, a media and information services company, creates and distributes authoritative and engaging content, and other products and services for consumers and businesses worldwide. It operates through six segments: Digital Real Estate Services, Subscription Video Services, Dow Jones, Book Publishing, News Media, and Other.