Redmont Wealth Advisors LLC Sells 1,414 Shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Redmont Wealth Advisors LLC cut its holdings in Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) by 60.7% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 914 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock after selling 1,414 shares during the period. Redmont Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Apple were worth $213,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in AAPL. Verus Financial Partners Inc. grew its stake in shares of Apple by 0.3% in the second quarter. Verus Financial Partners Inc. now owns 16,929 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $3,566,000 after acquiring an additional 48 shares during the last quarter. Brown Financial Advisory boosted its stake in Apple by 3.8% in the 2nd quarter. Brown Financial Advisory now owns 1,364 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $287,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Core Wealth Management Inc. grew its position in Apple by 1.7% during the 2nd quarter. Core Wealth Management Inc. now owns 2,968 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $625,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares during the last quarter. Lowery Thomas LLC increased its stake in Apple by 0.7% during the 2nd quarter. Lowery Thomas LLC now owns 7,607 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $1,602,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Klein Pavlis & Peasley Financial Inc. raised its holdings in Apple by 1.1% in the second quarter. Klein Pavlis & Peasley Financial Inc. now owns 4,505 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $949,000 after buying an additional 51 shares during the last quarter. 67.73% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Apple

In other news, insider Chris Kondo sold 4,130 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $228.87, for a total transaction of $945,233.10. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 15,419 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,528,946.53. The trade was a 21.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, COO Jeffrey E. Williams sold 59,730 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, October 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $226.86, for a total transaction of $13,550,347.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 489,944 shares in the company, valued at $111,148,695.84. This represents a 10.87 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 408,170 shares of company stock worth $92,007,745. 0.06% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on shares of Apple to $275.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. Jefferies Financial Group lowered Apple from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $205.00 to $212.92 in a report on Monday, October 7th. Moffett Nathanson lowered their price target on Apple from $211.00 to $202.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, November 19th. StockNews.com downgraded Apple from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, Tigress Financial upped their target price on shares of Apple from $245.00 to $295.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 28th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have issued a hold rating, twenty-three have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $236.78.

Apple Stock Up 0.4 %

Shares of NASDAQ:AAPL opened at $247.77 on Wednesday. Apple Inc. has a 12 month low of $164.07 and a 12 month high of $248.21. The company has a current ratio of 0.87, a quick ratio of 0.83 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.51. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $230.80 and a 200 day moving average price of $222.26. The company has a market cap of $3.75 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 40.75, a PEG ratio of 2.38 and a beta of 1.23.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last released its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The iPhone maker reported $1.64 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.60 by $0.04. Apple had a return on equity of 152.94% and a net margin of 23.97%. The firm had revenue of $94.93 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $94.52 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.46 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Apple Inc. will post 7.43 earnings per share for the current year.

Apple Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, November 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, November 11th were paid a $0.25 dividend. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.40%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, November 8th. Apple’s dividend payout ratio is currently 16.45%.

Apple Profile

Apple Inc designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables, and accessories worldwide. The company offers iPhone, a line of smartphones; Mac, a line of personal computers; iPad, a line of multi-purpose tablets; and wearables, home, and accessories comprising AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod.