Graco Inc. (NYSE:GGG) Shares Sold by Magnetar Financial LLC

Magnetar Financial LLC cut its position in Graco Inc. (NYSE:GGG) by 7.3% during the first quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 3,145 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after selling 249 shares during the period. Magnetar Financial LLC’s holdings in Graco were worth $294,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Graco by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 17,229,664 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,494,846,000 after purchasing an additional 144,146 shares in the last quarter. PineStone Asset Management Inc. boosted its position in Graco by 19.0% during the fourth quarter. PineStone Asset Management Inc. now owns 3,118,703 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $270,579,000 after purchasing an additional 498,724 shares in the last quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH boosted its position in Graco by 4.1% during the fourth quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 1,802,128 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $156,353,000 after purchasing an additional 71,788 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Graco during the fourth quarter worth approximately $152,941,000. Finally, TD Asset Management Inc boosted its position in Graco by 14.5% during the first quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 1,440,378 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $134,618,000 after purchasing an additional 182,470 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 93.88% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have recently weighed in on GGG. William Blair restated a “market perform” rating on shares of Graco in a research report on Friday, April 26th. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on Graco from $99.00 to $96.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. StockNews.com downgraded Graco from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 12th. DA Davidson decreased their target price on Graco from $82.00 to $79.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Finally, Robert W. Baird decreased their target price on Graco from $87.00 to $86.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Graco presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $86.80.

Graco Stock Performance

Shares of GGG traded up $0.27 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $84.69. 44,472 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 736,532. The firm has a market cap of $14.31 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.11, a P/E/G ratio of 2.82 and a beta of 0.82. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $80.40 and a 200 day simple moving average of $85.44. Graco Inc. has a 52-week low of $69.78 and a 52-week high of $94.77.

Graco (NYSE:GGG) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, July 24th. The industrial products company reported $0.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.76 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $553.20 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $562.27 million. Graco had a return on equity of 22.40% and a net margin of 23.16%. Graco’s revenue was down 1.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.75 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Graco Inc. will post 2.99 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Graco Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, August 7th. Investors of record on Monday, July 22nd will be given a $0.255 dividend. This represents a $1.02 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.20%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, July 22nd. Graco’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 35.17%.

Graco Company Profile

Graco Inc designs, manufactures, and markets systems and equipment used to move, measure, control, dispense, and spray fluid and powder materials worldwide. The Contractor segment offers sprayers to apply paint to walls and other structures; two-component proportioning systems that are used to spray polyurethane foam and polyurea coatings; and viscous coatings to roofs, as well as markings on roads, parking lots, athletic fields, and floors.