Murphy Pohlad Asset Management LLC Has $782,000 Stock Holdings in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC)

Murphy Pohlad Asset Management LLC reduced its stake in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) by 2.4% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 9,759 shares of the company’s stock after selling 245 shares during the quarter. Murphy Pohlad Asset Management LLC’s holdings in Toro were worth $782,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Millennium Management LLC boosted its position in Toro by 11,970.3% during the second quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 393,008 shares of the company’s stock valued at $36,750,000 after acquiring an additional 389,752 shares during the last quarter. Nuance Investments LLC acquired a new stake in Toro during the third quarter worth approximately $29,146,000. Worldquant Millennium Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Toro by 71.2% in the third quarter. Worldquant Millennium Advisors LLC now owns 217,739 shares of the company’s stock worth $18,885,000 after purchasing an additional 90,538 shares in the last quarter. KBC Group NV lifted its stake in Toro by 945.5% in the fourth quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 82,111 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,577,000 after buying an additional 74,257 shares during the period. Finally, Benjamin Edwards Inc. lifted its stake in Toro by 6,995.4% in the third quarter. Benjamin Edwards Inc. now owns 74,005 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,418,000 after buying an additional 72,962 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.95% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, Raymond James dropped their target price on shares of Toro from $100.00 to $95.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $93.75.

Toro Trading Down 2.9 %

NYSE:TTC opened at $84.26 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $8.53 billion, a PE ratio of 21.01 and a beta of 0.72. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59, a current ratio of 1.81 and a quick ratio of 0.74. The Toro Company has a one year low of $76.95 and a one year high of $100.93. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $83.65 and a 200-day moving average of $86.00.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.95. Toro had a return on equity of 27.25% and a net margin of 9.14%. The company had revenue of $1.08 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.09 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.71 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts expect that The Toro Company will post 4.41 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Toro announced that its board has approved a stock buyback plan on Tuesday, December 10th that permits the company to repurchase 4,000,000 shares. This repurchase authorization permits the company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Toro Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, January 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 23rd were issued a $0.38 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 23rd. This represents a $1.52 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.80%. This is an increase from Toro’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.36. Toro’s dividend payout ratio is currently 37.91%.

Toro Profile

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.