Railway Pension Investments Ltd Purchases New Shares in Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL)

Railway Pension Investments Ltd bought a new stake in shares of Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) during the second quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm bought 198,200 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $11,896,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of BALL. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Ball by 0.8% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 35,855,312 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,415,214,000 after acquiring an additional 267,479 shares during the period. Parnassus Investments LLC lifted its stake in Ball by 5.0% in the 4th quarter. Parnassus Investments LLC now owns 21,062,707 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,211,527,000 after buying an additional 998,527 shares in the last quarter. Putnam Investments LLC boosted its holdings in Ball by 39.5% in the 4th quarter. Putnam Investments LLC now owns 5,815,825 shares of the company’s stock worth $334,526,000 after buying an additional 1,645,909 shares during the last quarter. Boston Partners increased its stake in Ball by 114.1% during the 1st quarter. Boston Partners now owns 4,057,645 shares of the company’s stock worth $273,347,000 after buying an additional 2,162,167 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Ball during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $168,372,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 86.51% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

BALL has been the subject of several research reports. Mizuho boosted their price target on Ball from $63.00 to $69.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, April 29th. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Ball from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $70.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Wednesday, August 14th. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their target price on Ball from $64.00 to $61.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, July 17th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price objective on Ball from $80.00 to $77.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Finally, Citigroup cut their target price on Ball from $73.00 to $66.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, July 8th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $69.08.

Ball Trading Down 0.3 %

Shares of Ball stock traded down $0.20 on Tuesday, reaching $64.14. The company had a trading volume of 109,175 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,870,499. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.93 and a current ratio of 1.18. The firm has a market cap of $19.91 billion, a PE ratio of 4.84, a PEG ratio of 1.78 and a beta of 0.85. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $62.02 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $64.76. Ball Co. has a 52-week low of $42.81 and a 52-week high of $71.32.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The company reported $0.74 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.70 by $0.04. Ball had a return on equity of 19.45% and a net margin of 32.79%. The company had revenue of $2.96 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.10 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.61 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was down 3.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that Ball Co. will post 3.09 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 17th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 3rd will be paid a $0.20 dividend. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.25%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, September 3rd. Ball’s payout ratio is 6.02%.

Ball Profile

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.