State Street Corp Raises Stake in Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

State Street Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 1.2% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 30,020,426 shares of the asset manager’s stock after purchasing an additional 348,751 shares during the quarter. State Street Corp owned about 4.16% of Blackstone worth $4,597,028,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of BX. Thurston Springer Miller Herd & Titak Inc. acquired a new stake in Blackstone in the 2nd quarter valued at about $26,000. CWM LLC raised its position in shares of Blackstone by 4.2% during the 2nd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 38,845 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $4,809,000 after acquiring an additional 1,583 shares in the last quarter. Lantz Financial LLC raised its position in shares of Blackstone by 11.7% during the 2nd quarter. Lantz Financial LLC now owns 2,762 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $342,000 after acquiring an additional 290 shares in the last quarter. Csenge Advisory Group raised its position in shares of Blackstone by 4.2% during the 2nd quarter. Csenge Advisory Group now owns 6,158 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $762,000 after acquiring an additional 250 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CX Institutional grew its stake in Blackstone by 4.7% during the 2nd quarter. CX Institutional now owns 2,541 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $315,000 after buying an additional 113 shares during the last quarter. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Blackstone news, Director Joseph Baratta sold 116,448 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, October 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $150.81, for a total value of $17,561,522.88. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 799,749 shares in the company, valued at $120,610,146.69. This represents a 12.71 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider John G. Finley sold 42,249 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $175.94, for a total value of $7,433,289.06. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 387,137 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $68,112,883.78. This trade represents a 9.84 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 1.00% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Blackstone Price Performance

Shares of NYSE BX opened at $185.50 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 0.71, a quick ratio of 0.71 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.58. The company has a market capitalization of $133.93 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 63.75, a PEG ratio of 1.58 and a beta of 1.51. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $171.11 and a two-hundred day moving average of $146.21. Blackstone Inc. has a twelve month low of $111.05 and a twelve month high of $200.96.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 17th. The asset manager reported $1.01 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.91 by $0.10. The business had revenue of $2.43 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.37 billion. Blackstone had a net margin of 19.46% and a return on equity of 17.53%. As a group, analysts expect that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.4 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, November 4th. Shareholders of record on Monday, October 28th were given a $0.86 dividend. This represents a $3.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.85%. This is a boost from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.82. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, October 28th. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is 118.21%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently issued reports on BX shares. TD Cowen raised their price target on Blackstone from $133.00 to $149.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Evercore ISI upped their price target on shares of Blackstone from $148.00 to $155.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 14th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on Blackstone from $125.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $164.00 to $177.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 10th. Finally, UBS Group upped their price target on shares of Blackstone from $140.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 16th. Thirteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Blackstone currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $157.63.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.