First County Bank CT Sells 374 Shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

First County Bank CT reduced its holdings in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR) by 19.1% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 1,588 shares of the conglomerate’s stock after selling 374 shares during the quarter. First County Bank CT’s holdings in Danaher were worth $365,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors also recently modified their holdings of DHR. FMR LLC grew its stake in shares of Danaher by 15.8% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 23,617,424 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $6,566,116,000 after buying an additional 3,217,631 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc increased its position in Danaher by 2.4% during the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,964,031 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $1,490,112,000 after buying an additional 139,989 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC raised its stake in Danaher by 3.0% in the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,097,986 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $1,417,342,000 after buying an additional 148,251 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Danaher by 2.6% in the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 4,552,640 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $1,265,725,000 after buying an additional 116,299 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA boosted its stake in shares of Danaher by 17.6% during the 3rd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 3,582,982 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $996,141,000 after acquiring an additional 535,254 shares during the period. 79.05% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have issued reports on DHR. Robert W. Baird cut their price target on Danaher from $278.00 to $277.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. KeyCorp upped their price target on shares of Danaher from $290.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 23rd. Bank of America upgraded shares of Danaher from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $290.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Friday, December 13th. Royal Bank of Canada decreased their target price on Danaher from $333.00 to $311.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Finally, Scotiabank started coverage on Danaher in a report on Monday, December 23rd. They set a “sector perform” rating and a $265.00 price target for the company. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $286.80.

Danaher Price Performance

Shares of DHR stock traded up $1.45 during trading hours on Tuesday, reaching $239.65. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 1,763,681 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,621,022. Danaher Co. has a fifty-two week low of $222.53 and a fifty-two week high of $281.70. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $236.25 and its 200-day simple moving average is $254.22. The company has a quick ratio of 1.01, a current ratio of 1.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32. The company has a market capitalization of $173.09 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 45.73, a PEG ratio of 4.33 and a beta of 0.83.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The conglomerate reported $1.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.57 by $0.14. The business had revenue of $5.80 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.59 billion. Danaher had a return on equity of 10.62% and a net margin of 16.39%. Danaher’s revenue was up 3.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $2.02 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts forecast that Danaher Co. will post 7.5 earnings per share for the current year.

Danaher Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 31st. Shareholders of record on Friday, December 27th will be given a $0.27 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, December 27th. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.45%. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio is currently 20.61%.

About Danaher

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.