Toro Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:TTC)

The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) was the recipient of unusually large options trading activity on Wednesday. Traders purchased 1,176 put options on the company. This is an increase of approximately 1,709% compared to the typical volume of 65 put options.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Toro

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Point72 Asset Management L.P. lifted its position in shares of Toro by 682.7% during the second quarter. Point72 Asset Management L.P. now owns 482,139 shares of the company’s stock worth $45,085,000 after purchasing an additional 420,539 shares during the last quarter. Millennium Management LLC grew its position in shares of Toro by 11,970.3% in the 2nd quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 393,008 shares of the company’s stock worth $36,750,000 after acquiring an additional 389,752 shares in the last quarter. Nuance Investments LLC bought a new stake in shares of Toro in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $29,146,000. Marshall Wace LLP bought a new position in Toro during the second quarter worth $25,166,000. Finally, Ensign Peak Advisors Inc boosted its holdings in Toro by 41.0% in the second quarter. Ensign Peak Advisors Inc now owns 600,626 shares of the company’s stock worth $56,165,000 after purchasing an additional 174,545 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.95% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Separately, Raymond James reduced their target price on shares of Toro from $100.00 to $95.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, December 20th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Toro has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $93.75.

Toro Stock Up 1.1 %

NYSE TTC opened at $79.23 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.85, a current ratio of 1.94 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59. Toro has a fifty-two week low of $77.15 and a fifty-two week high of $100.93. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $83.53 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $86.84. The stock has a market cap of $8.02 billion, a PE ratio of 20.80 and a beta of 0.72.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.95. Toro had a net margin of 8.89% and a return on equity of 25.94%. The business had revenue of $1.08 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.09 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.71 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Toro will post 4.16 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Toro declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share repurchase plan on Tuesday, December 10th that allows the company to repurchase 4,000,000 shares. This repurchase authorization allows the company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are usually a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Toro Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, January 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 23rd will be given a dividend of $0.38 per share. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.92%. This is a positive change from Toro’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.36. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 23rd. Toro’s payout ratio is presently 37.91%.

Toro Company Profile

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.