Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) Receives Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Analysts

Shares of Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) have received a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” from the six analysts that are currently covering the firm, MarketBeat reports. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a hold recommendation and five have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1 year target price among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $137.33.

Several brokerages have recently commented on INGR. BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on Ingredion from $120.00 to $128.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Ingredion from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Barclays upgraded shares of Ingredion from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $122.00 to $145.00 in a report on Friday, August 9th. Oppenheimer lifted their target price on shares of Ingredion from $126.00 to $138.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, August 7th. Finally, UBS Group upped their price target on Ingredion from $141.00 to $148.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 15th.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ingredion

In related news, SVP Robert A. Ritchie sold 1,195 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, July 31st. The stock was sold at an average price of $125.00, for a total transaction of $149,375.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 15,906 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,988,250. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other Ingredion news, CEO James P. Zallie sold 1,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $134.02, for a total value of $134,020.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 52,530 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,040,070.60. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, SVP Robert A. Ritchie sold 1,195 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, July 31st. The shares were sold at an average price of $125.00, for a total transaction of $149,375.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 15,906 shares in the company, valued at $1,988,250. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 26,045 shares of company stock valued at $3,482,491 in the last 90 days. Company insiders own 1.80% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Ingredion

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of INGR. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Ingredion by 5.8% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 7,773,126 shares of the company’s stock valued at $843,617,000 after purchasing an additional 427,496 shares in the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its position in shares of Ingredion by 4.9% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,685,339 shares of the company’s stock worth $308,009,000 after buying an additional 125,543 shares during the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. grew its position in shares of Ingredion by 92.4% in the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 1,764,012 shares of the company’s stock valued at $202,332,000 after buying an additional 846,967 shares during the last quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP raised its stake in Ingredion by 2.7% during the 2nd quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP now owns 1,018,002 shares of the company’s stock worth $116,765,000 after acquiring an additional 27,087 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Equity Investment Corp lifted its position in Ingredion by 2.8% in the second quarter. Equity Investment Corp now owns 978,636 shares of the company’s stock valued at $112,250,000 after acquiring an additional 26,526 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 85.27% of the company’s stock.

Ingredion Stock Down 0.2 %

NYSE INGR opened at $134.60 on Friday. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $126.58 and its 200-day simple moving average is $119.48. The company has a quick ratio of 1.51, a current ratio of 2.52 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.47. The firm has a market cap of $8.76 billion, a PE ratio of 13.49, a P/E/G ratio of 1.23 and a beta of 0.73. Ingredion has a 52 week low of $89.54 and a 52 week high of $137.21.

Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, August 6th. The company reported $2.87 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.53 by $0.34. Ingredion had a net margin of 8.47% and a return on equity of 17.18%. The company had revenue of $1.88 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.98 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.32 earnings per share. Ingredion’s quarterly revenue was down 9.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Ingredion will post 9.95 earnings per share for the current year.

Ingredion Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, October 22nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, October 1st will be paid a dividend of $0.80 per share. This is an increase from Ingredion’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.78. This represents a $3.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.38%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, October 1st. Ingredion’s dividend payout ratio is presently 31.26%.

About Ingredion

Ingredion Incorporated, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells sweeteners, starches, nutrition ingredients, and biomaterial solutions derived from wet milling and processing corn, and other starch-based materials to a range of industries in North America, South America, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.