Norges Bank Makes New Investment in CubeSmart (NYSE:CUBE)

Norges Bank purchased a new position in CubeSmart (NYSE:CUBE) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 9,523,077 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock, valued at approximately $408,064,000. Norges Bank owned about 4.21% of CubeSmart at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in CUBE. Blue Trust Inc. lifted its holdings in CubeSmart by 74.9% in the 4th quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 675 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $29,000 after purchasing an additional 289 shares during the last quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp raised its position in shares of CubeSmart by 134.1% in the fourth quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp now owns 679 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $29,000 after purchasing an additional 389 shares during the period. Versant Capital Management Inc lifted its stake in shares of CubeSmart by 9,614.3% in the fourth quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 680 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $29,000 after buying an additional 673 shares during the last quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of CubeSmart by 310.6% during the 4th quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 739 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $32,000 after buying an additional 559 shares during the period. Finally, UMB Bank n.a. boosted its holdings in shares of CubeSmart by 59.4% during the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 942 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $40,000 after buying an additional 351 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 97.61% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have weighed in on CUBE. Scotiabank lowered shares of CubeSmart from a “sector outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and cut their target price for the stock from $52.00 to $46.00 in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th. KeyCorp raised CubeSmart from a “sector weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $47.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Thursday, March 6th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their target price on CubeSmart from $53.00 to $48.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, March 3rd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upgraded CubeSmart from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating and cut their price target for the stock from $46.00 to $45.00 in a report on Friday, January 10th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price objective on shares of CubeSmart from $50.00 to $44.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, February 21st. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, CubeSmart currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $48.00.

CubeSmart Price Performance

Shares of CubeSmart stock opened at $42.03 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $9.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 11.58 and a beta of 0.88. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $41.88 and its 200-day simple moving average is $45.78. CubeSmart has a twelve month low of $39.80 and a twelve month high of $55.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.02, a quick ratio of 0.20 and a current ratio of 0.20.

CubeSmart (NYSE:CUBE) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 27th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.68 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.23. The company had revenue of $231.41 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $267.54 million. CubeSmart had a return on equity of 14.33% and a net margin of 37.79%. As a group, research analysts expect that CubeSmart will post 2.64 EPS for the current fiscal year.

CubeSmart Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 15th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, April 1st will be paid a $0.52 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, April 1st. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.95%. CubeSmart’s dividend payout ratio is presently 120.93%.

CubeSmart Profile

CubeSmart is a self-administered and self-managed real estate investment trust. The Company's self-storage properties are designed to offer affordable, easily accessible and, in most locations, climate-controlled storage space for residential and commercial customers. According to the 2023 Self-Storage Almanac, CubeSmart is one of the top three owners and operators of self-storage properties in the United States.