Sompo Asset Management Co. Ltd. Sells 420 Shares of Aflac Incorporated (NYSE:AFL)

Sompo Asset Management Co. Ltd. reduced its position in shares of Aflac Incorporated (NYSE:AFL) by 16.8% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,080 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 420 shares during the quarter. Sompo Asset Management Co. Ltd.’s holdings in Aflac were worth $233,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of AFL. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its holdings in shares of Aflac by 6.3% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 4,807,079 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $429,319,000 after buying an additional 285,576 shares during the last quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. boosted its holdings in shares of Aflac by 1.3% in the second quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. now owns 2,429,316 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $202,437,000 after buying an additional 31,752 shares during the last quarter. Guinness Asset Management LTD boosted its holdings in shares of Aflac by 3.8% in the third quarter. Guinness Asset Management LTD now owns 2,276,325 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $254,382,000 after buying an additional 83,289 shares during the last quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Aflac by 5.6% in the second quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 2,220,125 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $198,279,000 after buying an additional 117,504 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Truist Financial Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Aflac by 26.6% in the second quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 1,929,662 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $172,338,000 after buying an additional 405,847 shares during the last quarter. 67.44% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on AFL shares. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Aflac from $91.00 to $98.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday, August 19th. Piper Sandler raised their price objective on shares of Aflac from $114.00 to $122.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. UBS Group lifted their price target on shares of Aflac from $84.00 to $109.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, August 14th. Bank of America lifted their price target on shares of Aflac from $115.00 to $124.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, October 10th. Finally, Evercore ISI lifted their price target on shares of Aflac from $84.00 to $90.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Thursday, September 26th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $97.93.

Aflac Price Performance

AFL stock opened at $112.39 on Monday. Aflac Incorporated has a one year low of $75.07 and a one year high of $115.50. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $110.73 and its 200-day moving average price is $100.66. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a quick ratio of 0.08 and a current ratio of 0.08. The company has a market capitalization of $62.44 billion, a PE ratio of 16.93, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.96.

Aflac (NYSE:AFL) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The financial services provider reported $2.16 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.69 by $0.47. Aflac had a net margin of 22.02% and a return on equity of 16.34%. The firm had revenue of $2.95 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.30 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.84 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 40.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Aflac Incorporated will post 7.22 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Aflac Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, November 20th will be given a $0.50 dividend. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.78%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, November 20th. Aflac’s dividend payout ratio is presently 30.12%.

Aflac Profile

Aflac Incorporated, through its subsidiaries, provides supplemental health and life insurance products. The company operates through Aflac Japan and Aflac U.S. segments. The Aflac Japan segment offers cancer, medical, nursing care, work leave, GIFT, and whole and term life insurance products, as well as WAYS and child endowment plans under saving type insurance products in Japan.