Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS Has $6.74 Million Position in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN)

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS cut its position in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) by 2.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 32,664 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 811 shares during the quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS’s holdings in Garmin were worth $6,737,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in GRMN. FMR LLC increased its position in Garmin by 40.8% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 3,775,154 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $664,540,000 after purchasing an additional 1,093,219 shares in the last quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. acquired a new position in Garmin during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $53,252,000. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. increased its position in Garmin by 1,580.3% during the 3rd quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. now owns 287,283 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $50,570,000 after purchasing an additional 270,186 shares in the last quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH increased its position in Garmin by 32.2% during the 4th quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 675,950 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $139,421,000 after purchasing an additional 164,818 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Teacher Retirement System of Texas increased its position in Garmin by 79.3% during the 4th quarter. Teacher Retirement System of Texas now owns 361,490 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $74,561,000 after purchasing an additional 159,860 shares in the last quarter. 81.60% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

GRMN has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Garmin to a “sell” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $164.00 to $171.00 in a research report on Tuesday, February 11th. Barclays upped their price target on shares of Garmin from $158.00 to $188.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on shares of Garmin from $219.00 to $260.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 20th. Finally, Tigress Financial upped their price target on shares of Garmin from $265.00 to $285.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 26th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Garmin currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $210.80.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Clifton A. Pemble sold 7,202 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $227.14, for a total transaction of $1,635,862.28. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 149,525 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $33,963,108.50. This represents a 4.60 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, VP Susan Lyman sold 2,829 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, March 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $215.51, for a total transaction of $609,677.79. Following the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 8,432 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,817,180.32. This represents a 25.12 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 24,342 shares of company stock valued at $5,486,094. 19.54% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Garmin Stock Performance

NYSE:GRMN opened at $209.78 on Friday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $216.96 and its 200-day moving average is $201.66. Garmin Ltd. has a 52 week low of $138.86 and a 52 week high of $246.50. The firm has a market cap of $40.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.70, a P/E/G ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 0.96.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 19th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $2.41 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.90 by $0.51. Garmin had a net margin of 22.42% and a return on equity of 19.31%. The company had revenue of $1.82 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.70 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.72 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 22.9% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Garmin Ltd. will post 7.8 earnings per share for the current year.

Garmin Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 27th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be paid a $0.90 dividend. This represents a $3.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.72%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 13th. Garmin’s dividend payout ratio is currently 41.04%.

Garmin Company Profile

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.