Valley Brook Capital Group Inc. Sells 181 Shares of Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT)

Valley Brook Capital Group Inc. trimmed its stake in Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT) by 1.7% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 10,696 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock after selling 181 shares during the quarter. Valley Brook Capital Group Inc.’s holdings in Abbott Laboratories were worth $1,210,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC raised its stake in shares of Abbott Laboratories by 13.2% in the third quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 16,975 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock worth $1,935,000 after purchasing an additional 1,985 shares during the last quarter. Fiduciary Alliance LLC raised its stake in shares of Abbott Laboratories by 83.5% in the third quarter. Fiduciary Alliance LLC now owns 7,304 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock worth $833,000 after purchasing an additional 3,324 shares during the last quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC raised its stake in shares of Abbott Laboratories by 2.9% in the third quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC now owns 3,153 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock worth $359,000 after purchasing an additional 89 shares during the last quarter. Creative Planning raised its stake in shares of Abbott Laboratories by 6.7% in the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 808,863 shares of the healthcare product maker’s stock worth $91,400,000 after purchasing an additional 50,592 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Allen Mooney & Barnes Investment Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Abbott Laboratories in the third quarter worth $204,000. 75.18% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insider Activity at Abbott Laboratories

In other Abbott Laboratories news, EVP Daniel Gesua Sive Salvadori sold 23,771 shares of Abbott Laboratories stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $128.50, for a total value of $3,054,573.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 125,697 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $16,152,064.50. This trade represents a 15.90 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 1.10% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

ABT has been the subject of a number of research reports. StockNews.com cut Abbott Laboratories from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday. UBS Group upped their price target on shares of Abbott Laboratories from $146.00 to $148.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 23rd. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $135.00 price objective on shares of Abbott Laboratories in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Stifel Nicolaus upped their target price on shares of Abbott Laboratories from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 23rd. Finally, Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of Abbott Laboratories from $107.00 to $117.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fourteen have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $133.06.

Abbott Laboratories Stock Up 0.1 %

Shares of ABT stock opened at $131.48 on Wednesday. The company has a market capitalization of $228.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.19, a PEG ratio of 2.39 and a beta of 0.75. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $117.75 and its 200-day moving average price is $115.42. Abbott Laboratories has a one year low of $99.71 and a one year high of $132.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 1.60 and a quick ratio of 1.14.

Abbott Laboratories (NYSE:ABT) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, January 22nd. The healthcare product maker reported $1.34 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $1.34. The company had revenue of $10.97 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $11.03 billion. Abbott Laboratories had a net margin of 31.95% and a return on equity of 20.74%. Abbott Laboratories’s quarterly revenue was up 7.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.19 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that Abbott Laboratories will post 5.14 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Abbott Laboratories Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Wednesday, January 15th will be paid a dividend of $0.59 per share. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.80%. This is a boost from Abbott Laboratories’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.55. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, January 15th. Abbott Laboratories’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 30.85%.

About Abbott Laboratories

Abbott Laboratories, together with its subsidiaries, discovers, develops, manufactures, and sells health care products worldwide. It operates in four segments: Established Pharmaceutical Products, Diagnostic Products, Nutritional Products, and Medical Devices. The company provides generic pharmaceuticals for the treatment of pancreatic exocrine insufficiency, irritable bowel syndrome or biliary spasm, intrahepatic cholestasis or depressive symptoms, gynecological disorder, hormone replacement therapy, dyslipidemia, hypertension, hypothyroidism, Ménière’s disease and vestibular vertigo, pain, fever, inflammation, and migraine, as well as provides anti-infective clarithromycin, influenza vaccine, and products to regulate physiological rhythm of the colon.