Raymond James Financial Inc. Invests $8.42 Million in Southern Copper Co. (NYSE:SCCO)

Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Southern Copper Co. (NYSE:SCCO) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor bought 92,391 shares of the basic materials company’s stock, valued at approximately $8,420,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its position in Southern Copper by 10.6% during the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 2,963,572 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $342,796,000 after acquiring an additional 283,562 shares during the last quarter. abrdn plc lifted its position in Southern Copper by 4.4% during the fourth quarter. abrdn plc now owns 2,849,638 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $260,428,000 after acquiring an additional 118,909 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp lifted its position in Southern Copper by 1.0% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,728,802 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $315,641,000 after acquiring an additional 27,358 shares during the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its position in Southern Copper by 74.6% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 1,402,983 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $162,283,000 after acquiring an additional 599,610 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in Southern Copper by 3.4% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 613,286 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $70,437,000 after acquiring an additional 20,204 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 7.94% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

SCCO has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Southern Copper from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $92.50 target price for the company in a research report on Monday, December 2nd. Scotiabank raised their price target on shares of Southern Copper from $52.00 to $72.00 and gave the stock a “sector underperform” rating in a report on Monday, March 10th. UBS Group raised shares of Southern Copper from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $120.00 price target for the company in a report on Thursday, March 13th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised shares of Southern Copper from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and decreased their price target for the stock from $106.30 to $102.00 in a report on Thursday, December 12th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Southern Copper has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $94.42.

Southern Copper Stock Up 1.8 %

NYSE:SCCO opened at $100.98 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $80.39 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.37, a PEG ratio of 1.90 and a beta of 1.12. Southern Copper Co. has a 1-year low of $84.33 and a 1-year high of $127.34. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $94.27 and its 200-day moving average price is $100.60. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.64, a current ratio of 2.77 and a quick ratio of 2.31.

Southern Copper (NYSE:SCCO) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 12th. The basic materials company reported $1.01 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.02 by ($0.01). Southern Copper had a return on equity of 40.27% and a net margin of 29.53%. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Southern Copper Co. will post 4.66 EPS for the current year.

Southern Copper Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, February 27th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were paid a $0.70 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.77%. This is a positive change from Southern Copper’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.60. Southern Copper’s dividend payout ratio is presently 64.81%.

Southern Copper Profile

Southern Copper Corporation engages in mining, exploring, smelting, and refining copper and other minerals in Peru, Mexico, Argentina, Ecuador, and Chile. The company is involved in the mining, milling, and flotation of copper ore to produce copper and molybdenum concentrates; smelting of copper concentrates to produce blister and anode copper; refining of anode copper to produce copper cathodes; production of molybdenum concentrate and sulfuric acid; production of refined silver, gold, and other materials; and mining and processing of zinc, copper, molybdenum, silver, gold, and lead.