Prudential Financial Inc. Raises Stake in Transocean Ltd. (NYSE:RIG)

Prudential Financial Inc. grew its stake in Transocean Ltd. (NYSE:RIG) by 899.8% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 495,675 shares of the offshore drilling services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 446,100 shares during the period. Prudential Financial Inc.’s holdings in Transocean were worth $1,859,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in Transocean by 1.2% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 78,811,863 shares of the offshore drilling services provider’s stock worth $295,544,000 after purchasing an additional 931,684 shares during the period. Cedar Wealth Management LLC raised its position in shares of Transocean by 7.1% during the 4th quarter. Cedar Wealth Management LLC now owns 104,128 shares of the offshore drilling services provider’s stock valued at $390,000 after buying an additional 6,916 shares during the period. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS acquired a new position in Transocean in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $547,000. American Century Companies Inc. grew its position in Transocean by 51.5% in the fourth quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 19,257,437 shares of the offshore drilling services provider’s stock worth $72,215,000 after acquiring an additional 6,542,271 shares during the period. Finally, Xponance Inc. increased its stake in Transocean by 25.4% during the fourth quarter. Xponance Inc. now owns 64,445 shares of the offshore drilling services provider’s stock worth $242,000 after acquiring an additional 13,070 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 67.73% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Transocean

In related news, EVP Roderick James Mackenzie sold 22,000 shares of Transocean stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $3.85, for a total value of $84,700.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 313,072 shares in the company, valued at $1,205,327.20. The trade was a 6.57 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 12.54% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the company. Citigroup decreased their price target on Transocean from $4.50 to $3.50 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, March 19th. Evercore ISI lowered shares of Transocean from an “outperform” rating to an “in-line” rating and lowered their target price for the stock from $6.00 to $5.00 in a research note on Wednesday, January 15th. TD Cowen reduced their price target on shares of Transocean from $6.50 to $5.50 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. SEB Equity Research set a $2.80 price objective on shares of Transocean in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Transocean from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $5.00 target price for the company in a report on Friday, December 6th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $5.03.

Transocean Stock Performance

NYSE:RIG opened at $2.15 on Friday. Transocean Ltd. has a 52 week low of $2.11 and a 52 week high of $6.88. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $3.30 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $3.86. The company has a quick ratio of 1.34, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.60. The company has a market cap of $1.89 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -2.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.86 and a beta of 2.72.

Transocean (NYSE:RIG) last released its earnings results on Monday, February 17th. The offshore drilling services provider reported ($0.09) EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.02 by ($0.11). The company had revenue of $952.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $962.28 million. Transocean had a negative return on equity of 0.52% and a negative net margin of 14.53%. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Transocean Ltd. will post 0.14 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Transocean

Transocean Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides offshore contract drilling services for oil and gas wells worldwide. It contracts mobile offshore drilling rigs, related equipment, and work crews to drill oil and gas wells. The company operates a fleet of mobile offshore drilling units, consisting of ultra-deepwater floaters and harsh environment floaters.