Franklin Resources Inc. Purchases New Stake in Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT)

Franklin Resources Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT) during the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 5,745 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock, valued at approximately $654,000.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in CBT. Wolff Wiese Magana LLC bought a new stake in shares of Cabot during the third quarter worth about $25,000. UMB Bank n.a. increased its holdings in Cabot by 53.9% during the 3rd quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 371 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $41,000 after purchasing an additional 130 shares in the last quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Cabot by 197.9% in the third quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 417 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $47,000 after purchasing an additional 277 shares during the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Cabot by 33.4% in the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 475 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $48,000 after purchasing an additional 119 shares in the last quarter. Finally, CWM LLC boosted its position in shares of Cabot by 35.6% during the third quarter. CWM LLC now owns 564 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $63,000 after buying an additional 148 shares during the last quarter. 93.18% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered Cabot from a “neutral” rating to an “underweight” rating and set a $105.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Mizuho increased their target price on shares of Cabot from $103.00 to $122.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $105.00.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Cabot news, CAO Lisa M. Dumont sold 865 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $111.74, for a total value of $96,655.10. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 9,742 shares in the company, valued at $1,088,571.08. The trade was a 8.15 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, EVP Jeff Ji Zhu sold 14,566 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $113.25, for a total value of $1,649,599.50. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 69,449 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,865,099.25. The trade was a 17.34 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 50,190 shares of company stock valued at $5,751,534. 3.07% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Cabot Stock Performance

Shares of Cabot stock opened at $90.64 on Tuesday. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $106.56 and its 200 day simple moving average is $102.97. The company has a current ratio of 2.08, a quick ratio of 1.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. Cabot Co. has a 12 month low of $70.63 and a 12 month high of $117.46. The firm has a market capitalization of $4.93 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.45, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.90 and a beta of 1.18.

Cabot (NYSE:CBT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, November 4th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.80 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.81 by ($0.01). Cabot had a return on equity of 26.60% and a net margin of 9.51%. The company had revenue of $1 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.01 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.65 earnings per share. Cabot’s quarterly revenue was up 3.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that Cabot Co. will post 7.67 EPS for the current year.

Cabot Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, December 13th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 29th were paid a dividend of $0.43 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, November 29th. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.90%. Cabot’s payout ratio is currently 25.52%.

Cabot announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase plan on Tuesday, December 3rd that allows the company to buyback 10,000,000 outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the specialty chemicals company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

About Cabot

Cabot Corporation operates as a specialty chemicals and performance materials company. The company operates through two segments, Reinforcement Materials and Performance Chemicals. It offers reinforcing carbons that are used in tires as a rubber reinforcing agent and performance additive, as well as in industrial products, such as hoses, belts, extruded profiles, and molded goods; and engineered elastomer composites solutions.