Jefferies Financial Group Cuts American Eagle Outfitters (NYSE:AEO) Price Target to $19.00

American Eagle Outfitters (NYSE:AEO) had its target price reduced by Jefferies Financial Group from $22.00 to $19.00 in a research report released on Tuesday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a hold rating on the apparel retailer’s stock.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently weighed in on the stock. TD Cowen cut their price objective on shares of American Eagle Outfitters from $25.00 to $23.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, August 30th. UBS Group cut their price objective on shares of American Eagle Outfitters from $35.00 to $34.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, August 30th. StockNews.com cut shares of American Eagle Outfitters from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, September 2nd. Telsey Advisory Group restated a “market perform” rating and set a $23.00 price objective on shares of American Eagle Outfitters in a research note on Wednesday, October 2nd. Finally, Barclays cut their price objective on shares of American Eagle Outfitters from $32.00 to $26.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, August 30th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $25.00.

American Eagle Outfitters Stock Performance

AEO stock opened at $18.20 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.50 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.56, a PEG ratio of 0.89 and a beta of 1.52. American Eagle Outfitters has a 1 year low of $15.92 and a 1 year high of $26.44. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $20.10 and its two-hundred day moving average is $21.08.

American Eagle Outfitters (NYSE:AEO) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, August 29th. The apparel retailer reported $0.39 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.38 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $1.29 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.31 billion. American Eagle Outfitters had a return on equity of 20.98% and a net margin of 4.58%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 7.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.25 earnings per share. As a group, analysts predict that American Eagle Outfitters will post 1.77 EPS for the current fiscal year.

American Eagle Outfitters Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, October 30th. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 11th were issued a dividend of $0.125 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 11th. This represents a $0.50 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.75%. American Eagle Outfitters’s dividend payout ratio is 40.00%.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Cary D. Mcmillan sold 2,283 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $21.49, for a total transaction of $49,061.67. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director David M. Sable sold 18,420 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $22.04, for a total value of $405,976.80. Following the sale, the director now owns 39,356 shares in the company, valued at approximately $867,406.24. This represents a 31.88 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 1,050,702 shares of company stock worth $21,148,718 in the last three months. 7.30% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of American Eagle Outfitters

A number of large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Congress Asset Management Co. acquired a new position in shares of American Eagle Outfitters during the third quarter valued at $119,691,000. Jupiter Asset Management Ltd. acquired a new position in American Eagle Outfitters in the first quarter valued at about $61,315,000. Victory Capital Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of American Eagle Outfitters by 165.4% in the second quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 3,107,933 shares of the apparel retailer’s stock worth $62,034,000 after acquiring an additional 1,936,938 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of American Eagle Outfitters by 179.1% in the second quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 2,691,474 shares of the apparel retailer’s stock worth $53,722,000 after acquiring an additional 1,726,982 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Renaissance Technologies LLC bought a new stake in shares of American Eagle Outfitters in the second quarter worth about $16,861,000. 97.33% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

American Eagle Outfitters Company Profile

American Eagle Outfitters, Inc operates as a multi-brand specialty retailer in the United States and internationally. The company provides jeans, apparel and accessories, and personal care products for women and men under the American Eagle brand; and intimates, apparel, activewear, and swim collections under the Aerie and OFFLINE by Aerie brands.