Sapient Capital LLC Cuts Position in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

Sapient Capital LLC lessened its holdings in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR) by 48.1% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 2,498 shares of the conglomerate’s stock after selling 2,319 shares during the quarter. Sapient Capital LLC’s holdings in Danaher were worth $574,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in DHR. FMR LLC lifted 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 worth $6,566,116,000 after buying an additional 3,217,631 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA lifted its stake in shares of Danaher by 17.6% in the third quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 3,582,982 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $996,141,000 after buying an additional 535,254 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Danaher by 40,196.5% in the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 429,964 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $119,539,000 after buying an additional 428,897 shares in the last quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Danaher by 30.4% in the third quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. now owns 1,705,884 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $465,617,000 after buying an additional 397,671 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Union Bancaire Privee UBP SA bought a new position in shares of Danaher in the fourth quarter worth approximately $74,551,000. Institutional investors own 79.05% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

DHR has been the topic of several analyst reports. Stifel Nicolaus upped their target price on shares of Danaher from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 23rd. Jefferies Financial Group lowered their price objective on shares of Danaher from $285.00 to $260.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. Citigroup lowered their price objective on shares of Danaher from $285.00 to $265.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Danaher from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, December 14th. Finally, KeyCorp increased their price objective on shares of Danaher from $290.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $278.00.

Insider Transactions at Danaher

In other news, SVP Brian W. Ellis sold 5,700 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, January 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $224.13, for a total value of $1,277,541.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 20,230 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,534,149.90. This represents a 21.98 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 11.10% of the company’s stock.

Danaher Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE DHR opened at $201.15 on Wednesday. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $231.96 and a 200-day moving average price of $251.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31, a current ratio of 1.40 and a quick ratio of 1.05. The stock has a market cap of $145.29 billion, a PE ratio of 38.10, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.68 and a beta of 0.83. Danaher Co. has a 1 year low of $199.75 and a 1 year high of $281.70.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The conglomerate reported $2.14 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.14. Danaher had a net margin of 16.33% and a return on equity of 10.82%. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.09 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Danaher Co. will post 7.67 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Danaher Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, December 27th were paid a $0.27 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, December 27th. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.54%. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 20.45%.

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.