Walleye Capital LLC Purchases New Stake in Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:SASR)

Walleye Capital LLC acquired a new position in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:SASR) in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 22,030 shares of the bank’s stock, valued at approximately $743,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Stifel Financial Corp acquired a new stake in Sandy Spring Bancorp in the third quarter valued at approximately $217,000. Barclays PLC raised its holdings in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp by 36.8% during the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 119,799 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $3,759,000 after purchasing an additional 32,223 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp by 3.4% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,072,619 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $33,654,000 after purchasing an additional 35,271 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. boosted its holdings in Sandy Spring Bancorp by 93.9% in the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 1,271,498 shares of the bank’s stock worth $41,235,000 after purchasing an additional 615,591 shares in the last quarter. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its position in Sandy Spring Bancorp by 96.9% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 70,599 shares of the bank’s stock worth $2,215,000 after buying an additional 34,735 shares during the last quarter. 66.90% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, StockNews.com assumed coverage on Sandy Spring Bancorp in a research note on Thursday, April 17th. They set a “sell” rating for the company.

Sandy Spring Bancorp Price Performance

NASDAQ SASR opened at $27.87 on Tuesday. The company has a market cap of $1.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 61.93 and a beta of 0.96. Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. has a 1 year low of $20.42 and a 1 year high of $39.55. The company has a current ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 1.02 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.50. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $29.60 and a 200 day simple moving average of $32.85.

Sandy Spring Bancorp (NASDAQ:SASR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 28th. The bank reported $0.47 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.48 by ($0.01). Sandy Spring Bancorp had a net margin of 2.65% and a return on equity of 5.31%. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. will post 2.48 EPS for the current year.

Sandy Spring Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, February 19th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, February 12th were issued a dividend of $0.34 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, February 12th. This represents a $1.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.88%. Sandy Spring Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 302.22%.

About Sandy Spring Bancorp

Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Sandy Spring Bank that provides commercial and retail banking, mortgage, private banking, and trust services to individuals and businesses in the United States. It offers financial products and services, including various loan and deposit products.