Zacks: Greif, Inc. (NYSE:GEF) Receives Average Recommendation of “Buy” from Analysts

Posted by ABMN Staff on Mar 23rd, 2016

Greif, Inc. (NYSE:GEF) has earned a consensus broker rating score of 2.17 (Buy) from the six analysts that cover the company, Zacks Investment Research reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, two have assigned a hold recommendation and three have assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company.

Brokers have set a one year consensus price objective of $34.00 for the company and are forecasting that the company will post $0.58 EPS for the current quarter, according to Zacks. Zacks has also assigned Greif an industry rank of 102 out of 265 based on the ratings given to its competitors.

Shares of Greif (NYSE:GEF) traded up 0.299% during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $31.865. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 195,490 shares. The company has a market cap of $1.52 billion and a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.187. The company has a 50-day moving average of $26.89 and a 200 day moving average of $30.77. Greif has a 1-year low of $23.88 and a 1-year high of $43.43.

Greif (NYSE:GEF) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, March 7th. The company reported $0.40 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.32 by $0.08. The firm earned $771.40 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $844.31 million. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.30 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 14.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts expect that Greif will post $2.24 EPS for the current year.

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, April 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 18th will be given a dividend of $0.42 per share. This represents a $1.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 5.29%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, March 16th.

An institutional investor recently raised its position in Greif stock. Acadian Asset Management raised its position in Greif, Inc. (NYSE:GEF) by 60.9% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 269,776 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 102,087 shares during the period. Acadian Asset Management owned about 1.05% of Greif worth $8,314,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

GEF has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Robert W. Baird lowered their target price on Greif from $37.00 to $33.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, March 9th. Zacks Investment Research raised Greif from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 10th.

Greif, Inc is a producer of industrial packaging products and services. The Company’s products include steel, fiber and plastic drums, rigid intermediate bulk containers, closure systems, transit protection products, water bottles and reconditioned industrial containers, and offers services, such as container life cycle management, blending, filling, logistics, warehousing and other packaging services.