Perennial Investment Advisors LLC Raises Stock Position in BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK)

Perennial Investment Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK) by 3.2% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 549 shares of the asset manager’s stock after purchasing an additional 17 shares during the quarter. Perennial Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in BlackRock were worth $563,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of BlackRock by 0.5% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 13,376,606 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $13,712,493,000 after purchasing an additional 68,405 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in BlackRock by 6.8% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,006,765 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $3,072,787,000 after buying an additional 190,188 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in BlackRock in the fourth quarter worth about $2,356,357,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its stake in shares of BlackRock by 17.0% during the fourth quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,102,643 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,130,330,000 after acquiring an additional 160,323 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Franklin Resources Inc. increased its holdings in shares of BlackRock by 5.2% during the fourth quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 1,060,159 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $1,086,780,000 after acquiring an additional 52,612 shares in the last quarter. 80.69% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts have commented on BLK shares. Citigroup lifted their price objective on shares of BlackRock from $1,150.00 to $1,200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, December 23rd. Bank of America decreased their target price on shares of BlackRock from $1,196.00 to $1,178.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their price objective on BlackRock from $1,215.00 to $1,275.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their target price on BlackRock from $1,155.00 to $1,175.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Finally, StockNews.com assumed coverage on BlackRock in a research report on Sunday. They set a “hold” rating for the company. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, BlackRock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $1,130.85.

BlackRock Trading Down 7.4 %

Shares of BLK stock opened at $822.38 on Friday. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $968.78 and a 200-day simple moving average of $992.26. BlackRock, Inc. has a 1-year low of $745.55 and a 1-year high of $1,084.22. The company has a market cap of $127.68 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.58, a PEG ratio of 1.90 and a beta of 1.38. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 5.23 and a quick ratio of 5.23.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, January 15th. The asset manager reported $11.93 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $11.52 by $0.41. The business had revenue of $5.68 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.57 billion. BlackRock had a net margin of 31.21% and a return on equity of 16.32%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 22.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $9.66 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that BlackRock, Inc. will post 47.41 EPS for the current fiscal year.

BlackRock Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 7th were issued a dividend of $5.21 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, March 7th. This represents a $20.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.53%. This is a boost from BlackRock’s previous quarterly dividend of $5.10. BlackRock’s dividend payout ratio is presently 49.62%.

Insider Activity

In other BlackRock news, Director J. Richard Kushel sold 10,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $1,072.64, for a total value of $10,726,400.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 68,433 shares in the company, valued at approximately $73,403,973.12. This trade represents a 12.75 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Insiders have sold a total of 20,430 shares of company stock worth $21,234,629 over the last quarter. 0.90% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

BlackRock Company Profile

BlackRock, Inc is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks.