New Century Financial Group LLC Increases Stock Holdings in Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

New Century Financial Group LLC increased its stake in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 60.1% during the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 2,459 shares of the asset manager’s stock after purchasing an additional 923 shares during the quarter. New Century Financial Group LLC’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $304,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.0% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 64,262,972 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $8,442,227,000 after purchasing an additional 1,290,324 shares during the period. Capital World Investors boosted its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 7.5% in the first quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 36,285,872 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $4,766,875,000 after acquiring an additional 2,546,886 shares during the period. Wulff Hansen & CO. increased its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 12,192.7% in the 2nd quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 7,340,845 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $908,797,000 after acquiring an additional 7,281,128 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc boosted its stake in Blackstone by 2.3% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 6,266,207 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $775,758,000 after purchasing an additional 141,616 shares during the period. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC increased its stake in Blackstone by 0.5% in the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 4,670,645 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $613,581,000 after purchasing an additional 21,450 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other Blackstone news, insider John G. Finley sold 35,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $131.74, for a total value of $4,610,900.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 429,386 shares in the company, valued at approximately $56,567,311.64. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently issued reports on the company. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price target on Blackstone from $145.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, August 15th. Redburn Atlantic assumed coverage on Blackstone in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $134.00 price target for the company. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $144.00 to $164.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 23rd. Piper Sandler lifted their target price on shares of Blackstone from $134.00 to $149.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, July 19th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on shares of Blackstone from $126.00 to $141.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, July 19th. Fourteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $130.78.

Blackstone Stock Performance

Shares of BX opened at $151.88 on Wednesday. The company has a 50-day moving average of $141.92 and a two-hundred day moving average of $130.86. The stock has a market cap of $108.54 billion, a P/E ratio of 53.67, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.51. Blackstone Inc. has a 12-month low of $88.59 and a 12-month high of $161.25. The company has a current ratio of 0.77, a quick ratio of 0.77 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.60.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, July 18th. The asset manager reported $0.96 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.99 by ($0.03). Blackstone had a net margin of 19.35% and a return on equity of 17.43%. The company had revenue of $3.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.58 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.93 EPS. Blackstone’s quarterly revenue was up 166.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.57 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Cuts Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 5th. Shareholders of record on Monday, July 29th were paid a dividend of $0.82 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, July 29th. This represents a $3.28 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.16%. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is currently 115.90%.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.