Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ:COST) Shares Up 0.5% After Analyst Upgrade

Costco Wholesale Co. (NASDAQ:COST) was up 0.5% during mid-day trading on Tuesday after Stifel Nicolaus raised their price target on the stock from $850.00 to $900.00. Stifel Nicolaus currently has a buy rating on the stock. Costco Wholesale traded as high as $850.00 and last traded at $849.76. Approximately 216,710 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 89% from the average daily volume of 1,958,245 shares. The stock had previously closed at $845.67.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently commented on COST. TD Cowen upped their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $777.00 to $850.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, May 31st. DA Davidson reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and issued a $680.00 target price on shares of Costco Wholesale in a report on Thursday, April 11th. Evercore ISI upped their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $860.00 to $890.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, June 20th. Loop Capital upped their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $890.00 to $940.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, June 14th. Finally, Oppenheimer upped their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $850.00 to $905.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, June 6th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $758.70.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Costco Wholesale news, EVP Russell D. Miller sold 785 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $722.86, for a total transaction of $567,445.10. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 10,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,228,600. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Bedel Financial Consulting Inc. raised its position in shares of Costco Wholesale by 1.3% during the 1st quarter. Bedel Financial Consulting Inc. now owns 995 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $729,000 after buying an additional 13 shares in the last quarter. Arlington Capital Management Inc. raised its position in shares of Costco Wholesale by 1.1% during the 1st quarter. Arlington Capital Management Inc. now owns 1,295 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $949,000 after buying an additional 14 shares in the last quarter. Enterprise Financial Services Corp raised its position in shares of Costco Wholesale by 1.6% during the 4th quarter. Enterprise Financial Services Corp now owns 892 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $589,000 after buying an additional 14 shares in the last quarter. Hoxton Planning & Management LLC raised its position in shares of Costco Wholesale by 0.9% during the 1st quarter. Hoxton Planning & Management LLC now owns 1,535 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $1,125,000 after buying an additional 14 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Investment Research & Advisory Group Inc. raised its position in shares of Costco Wholesale by 0.3% during the 1st quarter. Investment Research & Advisory Group Inc. now owns 4,472 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $3,276,000 after buying an additional 14 shares in the last quarter. 68.48% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Costco Wholesale Price Performance

The company has a market capitalization of $380.98 billion, a P/E ratio of 53.24, a P/E/G ratio of 5.63 and a beta of 0.78. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $804.55 and its 200 day simple moving average is $742.15. The company has a current ratio of 0.94, a quick ratio of 0.45 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27.

Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ:COST) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 30th. The retailer reported $3.78 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.70 by $0.08. Costco Wholesale had a net margin of 2.83% and a return on equity of 30.02%. The company had revenue of $58.52 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $58.16 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $3.43 EPS. Costco Wholesale’s revenue was up 9.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Costco Wholesale Co. will post 15.96 EPS for the current year.

Costco Wholesale Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 10th. Investors of record on Friday, April 26th were issued a $1.16 dividend. This is an increase from Costco Wholesale’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.02. This represents a $4.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.54%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, April 25th. Costco Wholesale’s payout ratio is presently 28.75%.

About Costco Wholesale

Costco Wholesale Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the operation of membership warehouses in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico, Japan, the United Kingdom, Korea, Australia, Taiwan, China, Spain, France, Iceland, New Zealand, and Sweden. The company offers branded and private-label products in a range of merchandise categories.