California State Teachers Retirement System Reduces Stock Position in Lazard Ltd (NYSE:LAZ)

California State Teachers Retirement System cut its stake in Lazard Ltd (NYSE:LAZ) by 6.8% in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 31,936 shares of the asset manager’s stock after selling 2,322 shares during the period. California State Teachers Retirement System’s holdings in Lazard were worth $1,057,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other large investors have also made changes to their positions in LAZ. CoreCap Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Lazard in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $25,000. CENTRAL TRUST Co lifted its holdings in Lazard by 88.7% in the third quarter. CENTRAL TRUST Co now owns 800 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $25,000 after acquiring an additional 376 shares during the last quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC grew its position in Lazard by 489.4% in the third quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 1,727 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $55,000 after acquiring an additional 1,434 shares during the period. CWM LLC raised its position in Lazard by 318.2% in the first quarter. CWM LLC now owns 1,815 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $60,000 after purchasing an additional 1,381 shares during the period. Finally, PNC Financial Services Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Lazard by 64.3% in the 1st quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 1,839 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $63,000 after purchasing an additional 720 shares during the last quarter. 57.64% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

LAZ has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Lazard from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $36.00 to $43.00 in a report on Wednesday, July 12th. StockNews.com assumed coverage on shares of Lazard in a report on Thursday, August 17th. They issued a “hold” rating on the stock. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upgraded shares of Lazard from an “underperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $31.00 to $36.00 in a report on Thursday, July 13th. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Lazard from $32.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, July 31st. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Lazard from an “underperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a report on Monday, July 3rd. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $42.25.

Lazard Price Performance

Lazard stock opened at $35.08 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $3.96 billion, a PE ratio of -194.89 and a beta of 1.40. Lazard Ltd has a 52-week low of $27.71 and a 52-week high of $43.44. The company has a quick ratio of 1.56, a current ratio of 1.56 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.06. The company’s 50 day moving average is $33.72 and its two-hundred day moving average is $32.92.

Lazard (NYSE:LAZ) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 27th. The asset manager reported $0.24 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.11 by $0.13. The company had revenue of $620.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $572.06 million. Lazard had a net margin of 0.07% and a return on equity of 30.45%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 8.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.92 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Lazard Ltd will post 0.82 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Lazard Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 18th. Shareholders of record on Monday, August 7th were issued a dividend of $0.50 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 4th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 5.70%. Lazard’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently -1,111.11%.

Lazard Profile

Lazard Ltd, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a financial advisory and asset management firm in North America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Central and South America. It operates in two segments, Financial Advisory and Asset Management. The Financial Advisory segment offers various financial advisory services regarding mergers and acquisitions, restructurings, capital advisory, shareholder advisory, capital raising, sovereign advisory, and other strategic advisory matters.