The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company Has $2.88 Billion Stock Holdings in NVIDIA Co. (NASDAQ:NVDA)

The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its holdings in shares of NVIDIA Co. (NASDAQ:NVDA) by 926.3% during the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 23,305,924 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock after purchasing an additional 21,034,967 shares during the period. NVIDIA comprises approximately 2.7% of The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company’s holdings, making the stock its 4th largest holding. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company’s holdings in NVIDIA were worth $2,879,230,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Diversified Investment Strategies LLC bought a new position in NVIDIA during the 1st quarter worth about $357,000. Lockerman Financial Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of NVIDIA by 65.1% during the first quarter. Lockerman Financial Group Inc. now owns 705 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock worth $637,000 after buying an additional 278 shares during the period. Investment Partners LTD. grew its holdings in shares of NVIDIA by 0.7% during the first quarter. Investment Partners LTD. now owns 2,350 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock worth $2,123,000 after buying an additional 17 shares in the last quarter. Lincoln Capital LLC raised its position in NVIDIA by 10.0% in the 1st quarter. Lincoln Capital LLC now owns 475 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock valued at $429,000 after buying an additional 43 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sunburst Financial Group LLC raised its position in NVIDIA by 3.6% in the 1st quarter. Sunburst Financial Group LLC now owns 3,288 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock valued at $2,971,000 after buying an additional 113 shares during the last quarter. 65.27% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have recently weighed in on NVDA. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on shares of NVIDIA from $155.00 to $165.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. William Blair began coverage on shares of NVIDIA in a research note on Wednesday, September 18th. They issued an “outperform” rating on the stock. Piper Sandler reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $140.00 price target on shares of NVIDIA in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on NVIDIA from $115.00 to $155.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Truist Financial upped their target price on NVIDIA from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 27th. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty-seven have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, NVIDIA currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $143.07.

NVIDIA Stock Up 0.5 %

Shares of NVDA opened at $141.25 on Wednesday. The company has a current ratio of 4.27, a quick ratio of 3.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15. NVIDIA Co. has a 12 month low of $39.23 and a 12 month high of $144.42. The firm’s 50 day moving average is $124.74 and its 200-day moving average is $115.18. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.46 trillion, a PE ratio of 66.25, a P/E/G ratio of 1.50 and a beta of 1.67.

NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 28th. The computer hardware maker reported $0.68 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.64 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $30.04 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $28.74 billion. NVIDIA had a return on equity of 113.50% and a net margin of 55.04%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 122.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.25 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that NVIDIA Co. will post 2.65 EPS for the current year.

NVIDIA Cuts Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 3rd. Investors of record on Thursday, September 12th were given a dividend of $0.01 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, September 12th. This represents a $0.04 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.03%. NVIDIA’s dividend payout ratio is 1.88%.

NVIDIA declared that its Board of Directors has approved a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, August 28th that authorizes the company to repurchase $50.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the computer hardware maker to buy up to 1.6% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Donald F. Robertson, Jr. sold 4,500 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $116.51, for a total value of $524,295.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 492,409 shares in the company, valued at approximately $57,370,572.59. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, insider Donald F. Robertson, Jr. sold 4,500 shares of NVIDIA stock in a transaction on Friday, September 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $116.51, for a total value of $524,295.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 492,409 shares in the company, valued at approximately $57,370,572.59. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, Director Mark A. Stevens sold 155,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $132.27, for a total value of $20,501,850.00. Following the sale, the director now owns 8,100,117 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,071,402,475.59. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 2,636,270 shares of company stock worth $305,367,927 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 4.23% of the company’s stock.

About NVIDIA

NVIDIA Corporation provides graphics and compute and networking solutions in the United States, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, and internationally. The Graphics segment offers GeForce GPUs for gaming and PCs, the GeForce NOW game streaming service and related infrastructure, and solutions for gaming platforms; Quadro/NVIDIA RTX GPUs for enterprise workstation graphics; virtual GPU or vGPU software for cloud-based visual and virtual computing; automotive platforms for infotainment systems; and Omniverse software for building and operating metaverse and 3D internet applications.