Pentair (NYSE:PNR) Upgraded by Baird R W to “Strong-Buy” Rating

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) was upgraded by investment analysts at Baird R W from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report released on Tuesday,Zacks.com reports.

Several other analysts have also recently issued reports on the stock. StockNews.com raised shares of Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Pentair from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $114.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. Wolfe Research started coverage on shares of Pentair in a research report on Tuesday, November 26th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $125.00 price target on the stock. KeyCorp reissued a “sector weight” rating and issued a $115.00 price objective on shares of Pentair in a report on Monday, January 6th. Finally, Northcoast Research raised Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 5th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $112.93.

Pentair Stock Performance

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

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The industrial products company reported $1.08 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.02 by $0.06. Pentair had a return on equity of 20.94% and a net margin of 15.32%. The firm had revenue of $972.90 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $970.95 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.87 earnings per share. Pentair’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts anticipate that Pentair will post 4.77 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Pentair

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in PNR. Northern Trust Corp boosted its position in Pentair by 27.9% during the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 1,962,263 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $197,482,000 after acquiring an additional 428,184 shares during the period. Teacher Retirement System of Texas raised its stake in shares of Pentair by 219.0% during the fourth quarter. Teacher Retirement System of Texas now owns 604,758 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $60,863,000 after purchasing an additional 415,163 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC lifted its holdings in Pentair by 7.0% in the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,101,253 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $614,030,000 after purchasing an additional 396,581 shares during the period. National Bank of Canada FI grew its position in Pentair by 862.2% in the 3rd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 441,887 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $43,212,000 after buying an additional 395,962 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in Pentair during the 4th quarter valued at about $36,568,000. 92.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About Pentair

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.