Maryland State Retirement & Pension System Decreases Position in Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL)

Maryland State Retirement & Pension System lessened its position in Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) by 11.4% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 15,758 shares of the company’s stock after selling 2,030 shares during the period. Maryland State Retirement & Pension System’s holdings in Ball were worth $869,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in BALL. Everence Capital Management Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Ball in the fourth quarter worth approximately $774,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in Ball in the fourth quarter worth approximately $94,861,000. Estate Counselors LLC bought a new stake in Ball in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $1,825,000. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA raised its stake in Ball by 531,933.3% during the 4th quarter. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA now owns 47,883 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,707,000 after buying an additional 47,874 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Ball by 2.0% during the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,891,046 shares of the company’s stock valued at $104,253,000 after buying an additional 36,809 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 86.51% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts recently commented on the company. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price objective on Ball from $75.00 to $66.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Barclays reduced their target price on shares of Ball from $72.00 to $61.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Wells Fargo & Company reiterated an “underweight” rating and set a $49.00 price target (down previously from $56.00) on shares of Ball in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Truist Financial cut their price objective on shares of Ball from $78.00 to $73.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lowered their target price on Ball from $75.00 to $70.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $63.30.

Ball Stock Down 1.7 %

NYSE BALL opened at $50.69 on Monday. The company has a current ratio of 1.00, a quick ratio of 0.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.90. Ball Co. has a 12 month low of $48.95 and a 12 month high of $71.32. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $52.47 and its 200 day moving average is $58.35. The stock has a market cap of $14.31 billion, a PE ratio of 4.00, a P/E/G ratio of 1.24 and a beta of 0.99.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.84 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.81 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $2.88 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.92 billion. Ball had a net margin of 33.98% and a return on equity of 16.17%. The business’s revenue was down .8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.78 EPS. Research analysts predict that Ball Co. will post 3.48 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Ball declared that its board has authorized a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, January 29th that allows the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the company to purchase up to 24.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Ball Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 17th. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 3rd were paid a $0.20 dividend. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.58%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, March 3rd. Ball’s payout ratio is 6.32%.

About Ball

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.