Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) Receives $63.20 Average PT from Analysts

Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) has been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the eleven ratings firms that are covering the firm, Marketbeat Ratings reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, four have issued a hold recommendation, five have issued a buy recommendation and one has issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average 12 month target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $63.20.

Several equities research analysts recently commented on the company. Citigroup reduced their price objective on Ball from $69.00 to $59.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 6th. UBS Group reduced their price target on shares of Ball from $55.00 to $54.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, April 7th. Truist Financial lowered their price objective on shares of Ball from $78.00 to $73.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their target price on shares of Ball from $75.00 to $66.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, Robert W. Baird decreased their target price on shares of Ball from $70.00 to $63.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of large investors have recently made changes to their positions in BALL. Everence Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in Ball in the 4th quarter worth approximately $774,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new position in shares of Ball in the fourth quarter worth approximately $94,861,000. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA increased its stake in shares of Ball by 531,933.3% in the fourth quarter. Loring Wolcott & Coolidge Fiduciary Advisors LLP MA now owns 47,883 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,707,000 after purchasing an additional 47,874 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Ball by 2.0% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,891,046 shares of the company’s stock worth $104,253,000 after purchasing an additional 36,809 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Aviva PLC raised its position in shares of Ball by 63.4% during the 4th quarter. Aviva PLC now owns 523,765 shares of the company’s stock valued at $28,875,000 after purchasing an additional 203,298 shares during the period. 86.51% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Ball Price Performance

Shares of BALL opened at $48.12 on Wednesday. Ball has a twelve month low of $43.51 and a twelve month high of $71.32. The company has a market capitalization of $13.59 billion, a P/E ratio of 3.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.24 and a beta of 1.01. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $50.58 and a 200 day moving average of $56.48. The company has a quick ratio of 0.69, a current ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.90.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.84 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.81 by $0.03. Ball had a return on equity of 16.17% and a net margin of 33.98%. The business had revenue of $2.88 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.92 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.78 EPS. The company’s revenue was down .8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Ball will post 3.48 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, March 17th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 3rd were paid a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, March 3rd. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.66%. Ball’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 6.32%.

Ball declared that its board has authorized a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, January 29th that authorizes the company to buyback $4.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the company to repurchase up to 24.2% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually a sign that the company’s board believes its shares are undervalued.

About Ball

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.