Pentair (NYSE:PNR) Rating Increased to Strong-Buy at Baird R W

Baird R W upgraded shares of Pentair (NYSE:PNR) from a hold rating to a strong-buy rating in a report issued on Tuesday morning,Zacks.com reports.

PNR has been the subject of a number of other research reports. KeyCorp reaffirmed a “sector weight” rating and issued a $115.00 price objective on shares of Pentair in a research note on Monday, January 6th. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Pentair from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $114.00 price objective for the company in a report on Tuesday. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their target price on shares of Pentair from $126.00 to $125.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 24th. Wolfe Research began coverage on shares of Pentair in a research note on Tuesday, November 26th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $125.00 target price for the company. Finally, Northcoast Research upgraded shares of Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Pentair currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $112.93.

Pentair Trading Up 1.4 %

Pentair stock opened at $91.11 on Tuesday. Pentair has a 12-month low of $72.63 and a 12-month high of $110.71. The firm has a market capitalization of $15.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.36, a P/E/G ratio of 1.87 and a beta of 1.23. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $95.36 and a 200 day moving average of $98.81. The company has a current ratio of 1.60, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.46.

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The industrial products company reported $1.08 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.02 by $0.06. Pentair had a net margin of 15.32% and a return on equity of 20.94%. The firm had revenue of $972.90 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $970.95 million. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.87 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that Pentair will post 4.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Pentair Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 2nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, April 18th will be paid a $0.25 dividend. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.10%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. Pentair’s dividend payout ratio is currently 26.74%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Pentair

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Pentair by 0.7% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 20,216,366 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $2,034,575,000 after acquiring an additional 148,031 shares during the period. State Street Corp increased its position in shares of Pentair by 3.1% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 8,756,075 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $856,257,000 after acquiring an additional 259,922 shares during the period. FMR LLC raised its stake in shares of Pentair by 7.0% during the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,101,253 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $614,030,000 after acquiring an additional 396,581 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Pentair by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 4,086,763 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $410,240,000 after purchasing an additional 87,244 shares during the period. Finally, UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its holdings in Pentair by 6.7% during the 4th quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 3,468,651 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $349,085,000 after purchasing an additional 217,867 shares during the period. 92.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Pentair Company Profile

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets.