Empirical Finance LLC Sells 56 Shares of BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK)

Empirical Finance LLC lowered its stake in BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK) by 1.1% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 4,917 shares of the asset manager’s stock after selling 56 shares during the quarter. Empirical Finance LLC’s holdings in BlackRock were worth $5,040,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in BLK. State Street Corp grew its holdings in BlackRock by 0.7% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 5,983,583 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $5,681,472,000 after acquiring an additional 42,757 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of BlackRock by 1.1% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,816,577 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $2,663,330,000 after purchasing an additional 30,182 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC raised its position in BlackRock by 10.6% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 2,363,965 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $2,244,608,000 after purchasing an additional 226,135 shares during the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in BlackRock by 1.9% in the 3rd quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 2,192,247 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $2,081,561,000 after buying an additional 40,865 shares during the period. Finally, Pathway Financial Advisers LLC grew its position in shares of BlackRock by 89,389.4% in the 3rd quarter. Pathway Financial Advisers LLC now owns 1,046,131 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $993,312,000 after buying an additional 1,044,962 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 80.69% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at BlackRock

In other news, Director J. Richard Kushel sold 10,000 shares of BlackRock stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $1,072.64, for a total value of $10,726,400.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 68,433 shares in the company, valued at $73,403,973.12. The trade was a 12.75 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director Mark Wiedman sold 36,190 shares of BlackRock stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $1,045.90, for a total value of $37,851,121.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 6,480 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,777,432. The trade was a 84.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 110,190 shares of company stock worth $115,163,141 over the last quarter. 0.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages recently commented on BLK. UBS Group raised their price target on BlackRock from $1,017.00 to $1,045.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 21st. Citigroup boosted their price target on shares of BlackRock from $1,150.00 to $1,200.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 23rd. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price objective on shares of BlackRock from $1,225.00 to $1,160.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 13th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on BlackRock from $914.00 to $971.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their target price on BlackRock from $1,261.00 to $1,275.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $1,120.67.

BlackRock Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:BLK opened at $991.95 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $1,024.93 and a 200-day moving average price of $968.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 5.23 and a quick ratio of 5.23. The company has a market capitalization of $153.63 billion, a PE ratio of 23.62, a PEG ratio of 1.93 and a beta of 1.28. BlackRock, Inc. has a 1-year low of $745.55 and a 1-year high of $1,084.22.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 15th. The asset manager reported $11.93 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $11.52 by $0.41. The business had revenue of $5.68 billion during 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%. BlackRock’s revenue was up 22.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $9.66 EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that BlackRock, Inc. will post 47.44 EPS for the current fiscal year.

BlackRock Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 7th will be paid a dividend of $5.21 per share. This represents a $20.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.10%. This is an increase from BlackRock’s previous quarterly dividend of $5.10. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 7th. BlackRock’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 49.62%.

BlackRock 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.