International Flavors & Fragrances (NYSE:IFF) Upgraded to Buy at Vertical Research

International Flavors & Fragrances (NYSE:IFF) was upgraded by stock analysts at Vertical Research from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report released on Thursday, Marketbeat.com reports. The brokerage presently has a $109.00 target price on the specialty chemicals company’s stock. Vertical Research’s price target would indicate a potential upside of 24.53% from the company’s current price.

IFF has been the subject of several other research reports. Oppenheimer lifted their price objective on shares of International Flavors & Fragrances from $116.00 to $117.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 11th. Mizuho upgraded shares of International Flavors & Fragrances from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $109.00 to $120.00 in a research report on Tuesday, September 3rd. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of International Flavors & Fragrances from $108.00 to $111.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Stifel Nicolaus upped their price objective on shares of International Flavors & Fragrances from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 24th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on shares of International Flavors & Fragrances from $102.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, September 6th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $108.47.

International Flavors & Fragrances Stock Performance

Shares of IFF opened at $87.53 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $102.63 and a 200-day moving average of $98.09. International Flavors & Fragrances has a one year low of $69.73 and a one year high of $106.77. The company has a market cap of $22.38 billion, a PE ratio of -9.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.77 and a beta of 1.22. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.60, a current ratio of 2.38 and a quick ratio of 1.75.

International Flavors & Fragrances (NYSE:IFF) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 5th. The specialty chemicals company reported $0.62 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.08 by ($0.46). The firm had revenue of $2.93 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.83 billion. International Flavors & Fragrances had a negative net margin of 20.82% and a positive return on equity of 6.63%. The business’s revenue was up 3.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.89 EPS. As a group, equities analysts forecast that International Flavors & Fragrances will post 4.24 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Cutler Investment Counsel LLC acquired a new position in International Flavors & Fragrances during the third quarter worth $200,000. Natixis Advisors LLC raised its holdings in International Flavors & Fragrances by 4.3% during the third quarter. Natixis Advisors LLC now owns 169,226 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $17,757,000 after buying an additional 6,974 shares during the last quarter. Empowered Funds LLC raised its holdings in International Flavors & Fragrances by 6.5% during the third quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 4,130 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $433,000 after buying an additional 251 shares during the last quarter. Empirical Finance LLC raised its holdings in International Flavors & Fragrances by 3.2% during the third quarter. Empirical Finance LLC now owns 7,679 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $806,000 after buying an additional 238 shares during the last quarter. Finally, CIBC Asset Management Inc raised its holdings in International Flavors & Fragrances by 8.3% during the third quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 37,233 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $3,907,000 after buying an additional 2,855 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 96.02% of the company’s stock.

International Flavors & Fragrances Company Profile

International Flavors & Fragrances Inc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells cosmetic active and natural health ingredients for use in various consumer products in the United States, Europe, and internationally. It operates through four segments: Nourish, Health & Biosciences, Scent, and Pharma Solutions.