Freedom Investment Management Inc. Increases Holdings in Digital Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:DLR)

Freedom Investment Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Digital Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:DLR) by 24.0% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 5,726 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after buying an additional 1,107 shares during the quarter. Freedom Investment Management Inc.’s holdings in Digital Realty Trust were worth $927,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. increased its holdings in Digital Realty Trust by 2.5% during the third quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 4,843,432 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $783,812,000 after buying an additional 117,461 shares during the last quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board increased its stake in shares of Digital Realty Trust by 3.1% in the 2nd quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 4,826,432 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $733,859,000 after purchasing an additional 146,183 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc raised its holdings in Digital Realty Trust by 2.8% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 4,730,168 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $719,222,000 after purchasing an additional 129,799 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its position in Digital Realty Trust by 5.3% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 4,541,327 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $690,498,000 after purchasing an additional 228,585 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp grew its holdings in Digital Realty Trust by 2.7% during the second quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 2,351,319 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $357,518,000 after purchasing an additional 60,821 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 99.71% of the company’s stock.

Digital Realty Trust Trading Up 0.6 %

DLR stock opened at $195.28 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $64.78 billion, a PE ratio of 164.10, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.12 and a beta of 0.59. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $172.40 and a 200 day moving average price of $157.79. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a quick ratio of 1.61 and a current ratio of 1.61. Digital Realty Trust, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $130.00 and a fifty-two week high of $195.93.

Digital Realty Trust (NYSE:DLR) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 24th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.09 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.67 by ($1.58). The company had revenue of $1.43 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.43 billion. Digital Realty Trust had a net margin of 8.04% and a return on equity of 2.24%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.62 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Digital Realty Trust, Inc. will post 6.71 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Digital Realty Trust Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 17th. Shareholders of record on Friday, December 13th will be paid a $1.22 dividend. This represents a $4.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.50%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, December 13th. Digital Realty Trust’s payout ratio is currently 410.08%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on DLR. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Digital Realty Trust from $175.00 to $185.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, October 25th. Raymond James lifted their price target on shares of Digital Realty Trust from $170.00 to $190.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, October 25th. TD Cowen increased their price objective on shares of Digital Realty Trust from $120.00 to $128.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their target price on shares of Digital Realty Trust from $177.00 to $207.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 28th. Finally, Scotiabank increased their price target on Digital Realty Trust from $157.00 to $178.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating, eleven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Digital Realty Trust presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $170.37.

Digital Realty Trust Profile

Digital Realty brings companies and data together by delivering the full spectrum of data center, colocation, and interconnection solutions. PlatformDIGITAL, the company's global data center platform, provides customers with a secure data meeting place and a proven Pervasive Datacenter Architecture (PDx) solution methodology for powering innovation and efficiently managing Data Gravity challenges.