Kentucky Retirement Systems Has $594,000 Stake in The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS)

Kentucky Retirement Systems reduced its position in shares of The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS) by 8.3% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 22,198 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 2,021 shares during the period. Kentucky Retirement Systems’ holdings in Mosaic were worth $594,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the company. Manning & Napier Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Mosaic during the second quarter worth about $3,610,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its position in shares of Mosaic by 1,815.5% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,682,108 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $346,743,000 after purchasing an additional 10,124,427 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Mosaic by 5.1% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 39,357,229 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,277,536,000 after purchasing an additional 1,893,797 shares during the last quarter. UniSuper Management Pty Ltd grew its position in Mosaic by 647.8% during the first quarter. UniSuper Management Pty Ltd now owns 32,612 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,059,000 after buying an additional 28,251 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB grew its position in Mosaic by 6.2% during the second quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 1,240,678 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $35,856,000 after buying an additional 71,986 shares in the last quarter. 77.54% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have weighed in on MOS. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed a “sector perform” rating and issued a $30.00 target price on shares of Mosaic in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their target price on Mosaic from $29.00 to $27.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, September 24th. Barclays lowered their target price on Mosaic from $32.00 to $30.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Finally, Mizuho lifted their price objective on Mosaic from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Mosaic currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $33.22.

Mosaic Stock Down 1.6 %

MOS opened at $25.40 on Wednesday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $26.40 and a 200-day moving average price of $27.86. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.09 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.48, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 1.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.19 and a quick ratio of 0.49. The Mosaic Company has a one year low of $24.11 and a one year high of $38.30.

Mosaic (NYSE:MOS) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, November 12th. The basic materials company reported $0.34 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.58 by ($0.24). The company had revenue of $2.81 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.17 billion. Mosaic had a return on equity of 6.00% and a net margin of 3.24%. The firm’s revenue was down 20.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.68 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that The Mosaic Company will post 2.21 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Mosaic Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 19th. Investors of record on Thursday, December 5th will be paid a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.31%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 5th. Mosaic’s payout ratio is currently 74.34%.

About Mosaic

The Mosaic Company, through its subsidiaries, produces and markets concentrated phosphate and potash crop nutrients in North America and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Phosphates, Potash, and Mosaic Fertilizantes. It owns and operates mines, which produce concentrated phosphate crop nutrients, such as diammonium phosphate, monoammonium phosphate, and ammoniated phosphate products; and phosphate-based animal feed ingredients primarily under the Biofos and Nexfos brand names, as well as produces a double sulfate of potash magnesia product under K-Mag brand name.