Eastern Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBC) Short Interest Update

Eastern Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBC) was the target of a large growth in short interest during the month of September. As of September 15th, there was short interest totalling 3,760,000 shares, a growth of 9.6% from the August 31st total of 3,430,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 1,290,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 2.9 days.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms recently weighed in on EBC. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $19.00 target price (up from $17.00) on shares of Eastern Bankshares in a research note on Monday, July 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Eastern Bankshares from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their target price for the company from $14.00 to $18.50 in a research note on Tuesday, August 6th.

Insider Buying and Selling at Eastern Bankshares

In other news, President Quincy Lee Miller sold 12,676 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, September 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $16.66, for a total value of $211,182.16. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. 1.15% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its position in shares of Eastern Bankshares by 24.5% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 4,835,761 shares of the company’s stock valued at $67,599,000 after purchasing an additional 950,150 shares in the last quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its position in Eastern Bankshares by 11.8% in the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 3,795,493 shares of the company’s stock worth $52,300,000 after acquiring an additional 401,027 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its position in Eastern Bankshares by 19.3% in the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 3,464,674 shares of the company’s stock worth $49,198,000 after acquiring an additional 559,754 shares in the last quarter. Jennison Associates LLC grew its position in Eastern Bankshares by 23.8% in the first quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 2,993,308 shares of the company’s stock worth $41,248,000 after acquiring an additional 576,381 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grew its position in Eastern Bankshares by 9.5% in the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 2,231,126 shares of the company’s stock worth $31,682,000 after acquiring an additional 193,151 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 71.68% of the company’s stock.

Eastern Bankshares Stock Performance

Eastern Bankshares stock traded down $0.56 during trading on Tuesday, reaching $15.83. The company had a trading volume of 1,050,821 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,016,257. The company has a current ratio of 0.84, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.01. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $16.09 and its 200 day simple moving average is $14.46. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.80 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 5.75 and a beta of 0.89. Eastern Bankshares has a 52 week low of $10.65 and a 52 week high of $17.26.

Eastern Bankshares (NASDAQ:EBC) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 25th. The company reported $0.22 EPS for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.22. The business had revenue of $232.72 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $157.45 million. Eastern Bankshares had a return on equity of 5.06% and a net margin of 48.38%. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.28 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts forecast that Eastern Bankshares will post 1.11 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Eastern Bankshares Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 16th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 3rd were given a dividend of $0.11 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, September 3rd. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.78%. Eastern Bankshares’s payout ratio is 15.44%.

About Eastern Bankshares

Eastern Bankshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Eastern Bank that provides banking products and services primarily to retail, commercial, and small business customers. The company provides deposit accounts, interest checking accounts, money market accounts, savings accounts, and time certificates of deposit accounts.