AQR Capital Management LLC Acquires 411,084 Shares of Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN)

AQR Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) by 136.7% in the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 711,849 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after purchasing an additional 411,084 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Garmin were worth $115,177,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of GRMN. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its position in Garmin by 0.8% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,735,623 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $282,761,000 after purchasing an additional 13,968 shares during the last quarter. Boston Partners increased its stake in shares of Garmin by 4.3% in the first quarter. Boston Partners now owns 1,416,130 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $210,799,000 after buying an additional 58,343 shares during the period. Marshall Wace LLP raised its position in shares of Garmin by 34.0% during the second quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 1,098,443 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $178,958,000 after acquiring an additional 278,990 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Garmin by 28.4% in the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 862,527 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $110,869,000 after acquiring an additional 190,739 shares during the period. Finally, Captrust Financial Advisors boosted its holdings in Garmin by 20.2% in the first quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 839,537 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $124,982,000 after acquiring an additional 141,001 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 73.41% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Garmin

In related news, insider Cheng-Wei Wang sold 10,055 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, August 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $177.16, for a total value of $1,781,343.80. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 40,965 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,257,359.40. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. In other news, Director Philip Straub sold 2,750 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $181.46, for a total transaction of $499,015.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 88,622 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $16,081,348.12. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, insider Cheng-Wei Wang sold 10,055 shares of Garmin stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $177.16, for a total transaction of $1,781,343.80. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 40,965 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,257,359.40. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 12,892 shares of company stock valued at $2,296,174 in the last 90 days. 19.54% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have issued reports on GRMN shares. StockNews.com lowered shares of Garmin from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, September 12th. Tigress Financial increased their price objective on shares of Garmin from $210.00 to $215.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 19th. Finally, Barclays lowered shares of Garmin from an “equal weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $181.00 to $133.00 in a report on Friday, September 13th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $152.17.

Garmin Stock Performance

Garmin stock opened at $174.83 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $33.58 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.66, a PEG ratio of 3.04 and a beta of 1.00. Garmin Ltd. has a 52-week low of $99.61 and a 52-week high of $184.42. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $174.64 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $163.18.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $1.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.40 by $0.18. The company had revenue of $1.51 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.42 billion. Garmin had a net margin of 24.36% and a return on equity of 17.09%. Garmin’s quarterly revenue was up 14.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.45 EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Garmin Ltd. will post 6.05 EPS for the current year.

About Garmin

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.