Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) Holdings Boosted by Realta Investment Advisors

Realta Investment Advisors lifted its holdings in Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) by 146.5% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 9,064 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after buying an additional 5,387 shares during the period. Realta Investment Advisors’ holdings in Bank of America were worth $406,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of BAC. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 1.2% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 140,255,970 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $5,546,871,000 after purchasing an additional 1,700,141 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its position in Bank of America by 4.0% during the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 45,215,832 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,794,164,000 after purchasing an additional 1,731,003 shares in the last quarter. Sanders Capital LLC increased its stake in Bank of America by 2.8% in the 3rd quarter. Sanders Capital LLC now owns 22,341,213 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $886,499,000 after buying an additional 601,211 shares during the period. Diamond Hill Capital Management Inc. lifted its position in Bank of America by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. Diamond Hill Capital Management Inc. now owns 17,042,952 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $676,264,000 after buying an additional 59,853 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Bank of America by 1.8% during the 4th quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 15,857,556 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $696,940,000 after buying an additional 285,117 shares during the period. 70.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently issued reports on BAC. Barclays increased their price objective on Bank of America from $53.00 to $58.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, January 6th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Bank of America from $52.00 to $56.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, November 15th. Evercore ISI dropped their price objective on Bank of America from $53.00 to $51.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 17th. Citigroup upgraded shares of Bank of America from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their target price for the company from $46.00 to $54.00 in a research note on Friday, November 8th. Finally, Hsbc Global Res upgraded shares of Bank of America from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 7th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating, fifteen have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $48.58.

Bank of America Trading Up 1.3 %

Shares of Bank of America stock opened at $47.74 on Friday. Bank of America Co. has a 1 year low of $32.35 and a 1 year high of $48.08. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $45.77 and its 200-day simple moving average is $42.88. The company has a market cap of $366.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.83, a PEG ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.33. The company has a current ratio of 0.78, a quick ratio of 0.78 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.04.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 16th. The financial services provider reported $0.82 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.77 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $25.30 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $25.12 billion. Bank of America had a net margin of 14.10% and a return on equity of 10.29%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 15.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.70 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Bank of America Co. will post 3.67 EPS for the current year.

Bank of America Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 7th will be issued a $0.26 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 7th. This represents a $1.04 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.18%. Bank of America’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 32.30%.

Bank of America Company Profile

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides banking and financial products and services for individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, large corporations, and governments worldwide. It operates in four segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth & Investment Management (GWIM), Global Banking, and Global Markets.