Toro Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:TTC)

The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) was the target of some unusual options trading on Wednesday. Investors purchased 1,176 put options on the stock. This is an increase of approximately 1,709% compared to the average volume of 65 put options.

Toro Trading Down 0.7 %

Toro stock opened at $91.00 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a current ratio of 1.93. The stock has a market cap of $9.45 billion, a PE ratio of 35.97 and a beta of 0.69. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $91.99 and a two-hundred day moving average of $90.12. Toro has a one year low of $77.15 and a one year high of $103.12.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, June 6th. The company reported $1.40 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.29 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $1.35 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.34 billion. Toro had a net margin of 6.00% and a return on equity of 25.04%. Toro’s revenue was up .7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.58 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Toro will post 4.32 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, Robert W. Baird increased their target price on shares of Toro from $100.00 to $102.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 28th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Toro has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $99.25.

Insider Buying and Selling at Toro

In related news, CEO Richard M. Olson sold 20,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $95.19, for a total transaction of $1,903,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 17,913 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,705,138.47. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders own 1.62% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Evoke Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Toro during the fourth quarter worth about $2,479,000. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in Toro by 1.0% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 10,491,409 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,007,070,000 after acquiring an additional 103,300 shares during the period. TD Asset Management Inc boosted its holdings in shares of Toro by 334.2% in the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 818,260 shares of the company’s stock valued at $78,545,000 after acquiring an additional 629,820 shares during the last quarter. Cim LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Toro in the fourth quarter worth $12,882,000. Finally, Boston Trust Walden Corp raised its holdings in shares of Toro by 3.0% during the second quarter. Boston Trust Walden Corp now owns 325,053 shares of the company’s stock worth $30,396,000 after purchasing an additional 9,371 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.95% of the company’s stock.

About Toro

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.