Apella Capital LLC Purchases 411 Shares of Comcast Co. (NASDAQ:CMCSA)

Apella Capital LLC increased its stake in Comcast Co. (NASDAQ:CMCSA) by 6.6% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 6,612 shares of the cable giant’s stock after purchasing an additional 411 shares during the quarter. Apella Capital LLC’s holdings in Comcast were worth $248,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CMCSA. Capital World Investors raised its stake in shares of Comcast by 7.4% in the first quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 115,703,280 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $5,015,737,000 after purchasing an additional 7,929,963 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in Comcast in the fourth quarter valued at about $2,542,988,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its stake in Comcast by 41.7% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 28,016,389 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $1,214,512,000 after buying an additional 8,243,302 shares during the period. Harris Associates L P lifted its stake in Comcast by 10.9% in the fourth quarter. Harris Associates L P now owns 18,873,787 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $827,616,000 after buying an additional 1,854,671 shares during the period. Finally, LSV Asset Management raised its position in shares of Comcast by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 15,688,650 shares of the cable giant’s stock worth $687,947,000 after purchasing an additional 570,050 shares during the period. 84.32% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CMCSA has been the subject of a number of research reports. The Goldman Sachs Group assumed coverage on Comcast in a report on Tuesday, June 25th. They set a “buy” rating and a $44.00 price objective for the company. BNP Paribas cut Comcast from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and set a $34.00 price target for the company. in a report on Tuesday, June 11th. Benchmark reissued a “buy” rating and set a $55.00 price target on shares of Comcast in a report on Monday, May 13th. Macquarie reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $40.00 price objective on shares of Comcast in a report on Wednesday, July 24th. Finally, Evercore ISI decreased their target price on shares of Comcast from $50.00 to $48.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, July 2nd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Comcast has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $46.01.

Comcast Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:CMCSA traded down $0.41 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, reaching $38.51. 16,743,796 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 20,590,863. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $38.72 and its 200-day moving average price is $40.49. The firm has a market cap of $151.10 billion, a PE ratio of 10.19, a PEG ratio of 1.07 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.16, a current ratio of 0.66 and a quick ratio of 0.66. Comcast Co. has a 52 week low of $36.43 and a 52 week high of $47.46.

Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The cable giant reported $1.21 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.12 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $29.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $30.02 billion. Comcast had a return on equity of 20.17% and a net margin of 12.46%. Comcast’s quarterly revenue was down 2.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.13 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Comcast Co. will post 4.23 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Comcast Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 23rd. Investors of record on Wednesday, October 2nd will be given a dividend of $0.31 per share. This represents a $1.24 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.22%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, October 2nd. Comcast’s dividend payout ratio is currently 32.80%.

Insider Activity at Comcast

In other Comcast news, major shareholder Corp Comcast sold 3,176,923 shares of Comcast stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $3.19, for a total value of $10,134,384.37. Following the sale, the insider now owns 2,000,000 shares in the company, valued at $6,380,000. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. 1.26% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Comcast Company Profile

Comcast Corporation operates as a media and technology company worldwide. It operates through Residential Connectivity & Platforms, Business Services Connectivity, Media, Studios, and Theme Parks segments. The Residential Connectivity & Platforms segment provides residential broadband and wireless connectivity services, residential and business video services, sky-branded entertainment television networks, and advertising.