Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. Purchases New Holdings in OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC)

Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC) during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The institutional investor purchased 16,809 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock, valued at approximately $312,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Point72 Asia Singapore Pte. Ltd. grew its holdings in OceanFirst Financial by 82.3% during the 3rd quarter. Point72 Asia Singapore Pte. Ltd. now owns 3,055 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $57,000 after purchasing an additional 1,379 shares during the last quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors bought a new position in OceanFirst Financial in the 3rd quarter worth about $202,000. Cerity Partners LLC grew its stake in OceanFirst Financial by 4.7% in the 3rd quarter. Cerity Partners LLC now owns 41,905 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $779,000 after acquiring an additional 1,890 shares in the last quarter. John G Ullman & Associates Inc. grew its stake in OceanFirst Financial by 12.6% in the 3rd quarter. John G Ullman & Associates Inc. now owns 25,100 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $467,000 after acquiring an additional 2,800 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Foundry Partners LLC grew its stake in OceanFirst Financial by 8.5% in the 3rd quarter. Foundry Partners LLC now owns 14,564 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $271,000 after acquiring an additional 1,145 shares in the last quarter. 70.98% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have commented on OCFC shares. Piper Sandler set a $17.00 target price on shares of OceanFirst Financial and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. DA Davidson restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $22.00 target price on shares of OceanFirst Financial in a research note on Wednesday, December 4th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upped their target price on shares of OceanFirst Financial from $21.00 to $22.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 4th. Finally, Hovde Group increased their price objective on shares of OceanFirst Financial from $19.50 to $21.50 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, OceanFirst Financial presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $20.42.

Insider Activity at OceanFirst Financial

In related news, Director Joseph M. Jr. Murphy sold 1,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $20.03, for a total transaction of $30,045.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 177,417 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,553,662.51. This represents a 0.84 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 5.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

OceanFirst Financial Price Performance

NASDAQ OCFC opened at $19.94 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 1.00 and a current ratio of 1.01. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $19.33 and its 200-day moving average price is $17.50. OceanFirst Financial Corp. has a 52-week low of $14.03 and a 52-week high of $21.87. The company has a market cap of $1.17 billion, a PE ratio of 11.39 and a beta of 1.04.

OceanFirst Financial (NASDAQ:OCFC) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 17th. The savings and loans company reported $0.39 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.38 by $0.01. OceanFirst Financial had a net margin of 15.28% and a return on equity of 6.08%. The company had revenue of $96.90 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $92.79 million. Sell-side analysts forecast that OceanFirst Financial Corp. will post 1.59 EPS for the current fiscal year.

OceanFirst Financial Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Investors of record on Monday, November 4th were given a dividend of $0.20 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, November 4th. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.01%. OceanFirst Financial’s payout ratio is 45.71%.

OceanFirst Financial Profile

OceanFirst Financial Corp. operates as the bank holding company for OceanFirst Bank N.A. that provides community banking services to retail and commercial customers. It accepts money market accounts, savings accounts, interest-bearing checking accounts, non-interest-bearing accounts, and time deposits, that includes brokered deposits to retail, government, and business customers.