MONECO Advisors LLC Acquires 155 Shares of The Progressive Co. (NYSE:PGR)

MONECO Advisors LLC raised its holdings in The Progressive Co. (NYSE:PGR) by 14.5% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 1,226 shares of the insurance provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 155 shares during the quarter. MONECO Advisors LLC’s holdings in Progressive were worth $294,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Howard Capital Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Progressive by 5.1% during the fourth quarter. Howard Capital Management Inc. now owns 3,775 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $905,000 after purchasing an additional 182 shares during the period. Wealthspire Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of Progressive by 2.5% during the fourth quarter. Wealthspire Advisors LLC now owns 6,582 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $1,577,000 after purchasing an additional 162 shares during the period. TCW Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Progressive by 1.8% during the fourth quarter. TCW Group Inc. now owns 11,511 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $2,758,000 after purchasing an additional 207 shares during the period. Fisher Funds Management LTD bought a new position in shares of Progressive during the fourth quarter worth approximately $23,156,000. Finally, First Horizon Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Progressive by 6.0% during the fourth quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 2,300 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $551,000 after purchasing an additional 131 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 85.34% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

PGR has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on Progressive from $300.00 to $307.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on Progressive from $251.00 to $256.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price objective on Progressive from $295.00 to $294.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 10th. BMO Capital Markets lowered their price objective on Progressive from $273.00 to $267.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Progressive from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $277.59.

Insider Activity at Progressive

In other Progressive news, CAO Mariann Wojtkun Marshall sold 191 shares of Progressive stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $242.10, for a total transaction of $46,241.10. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 3,982 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $964,042.20. The trade was a 4.58 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Susan Patricia Griffith sold 11,021 shares of Progressive stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, January 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $243.29, for a total value of $2,681,299.09. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 473,736 shares in the company, valued at $115,255,231.44. The trade was a 2.27 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 56,361 shares of company stock valued at $13,983,575 in the last 90 days. 0.34% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Progressive Trading Up 2.2 %

Shares of PGR stock opened at $278.62 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a quick ratio of 0.30 and a current ratio of 0.31. The Progressive Co. has a fifty-two week low of $186.94 and a fifty-two week high of $279.93. The company has a market cap of $163.22 billion, a PE ratio of 19.35, a P/E/G ratio of 1.70 and a beta of 0.42. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $247.97 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $250.14.

Progressive (NYSE:PGR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The insurance provider reported $4.08 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.44 by $0.64. Progressive had a return on equity of 33.79% and a net margin of 11.25%. Equities analysts predict that The Progressive Co. will post 14.68 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Progressive Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, January 16th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 9th were issued a dividend of $0.10 per share. This represents a $0.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.14%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 10th. Progressive’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 2.78%.

About Progressive

The Progressive Corporation, an insurance holding company, provides personal and commercial auto, personal residential and commercial property, business related general liability, and other specialty property-casualty insurance products and related services in the United States. It operates in three segments: Personal Lines, Commercial Lines, and Property.