California Public Employees Retirement System Decreases Stock Position in Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX)

California Public Employees Retirement System reduced its stake in Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX) by 8.7% in the second quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 326,835 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 31,093 shares during the period. California Public Employees Retirement System owned approximately 0.19% of Cognex worth $18,309,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in CGNX. Caisse DE Depot ET Placement DU Quebec bought a new position in shares of Cognex in the first quarter worth $25,000. Nemes Rush Group LLC bought a new position in shares of Cognex in the second quarter worth $36,000. Altshuler Shaham Ltd bought a new position in shares of Cognex in the fourth quarter worth $44,000. Dark Forest Capital Management LP bought a new stake in Cognex during the first quarter valued at $60,000. Finally, Janiczek Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in Cognex by 32.6% during the second quarter. Janiczek Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,090 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $61,000 after buying an additional 268 shares during the period. 89.86% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on the company. BNP Paribas assumed coverage on Cognex in a research note on Thursday, October 5th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $55.00 price objective for the company. The Goldman Sachs Group dropped their price objective on Cognex from $45.00 to $40.00 and set a “sell” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, October 10th. Needham & Company LLC dropped their price objective on Cognex from $55.00 to $46.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, November 1st. Raymond James dropped their price objective on Cognex from $65.00 to $60.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, November 6th. Finally, Credit Suisse Group dropped their price target on Cognex from $47.00 to $46.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, August 7th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have issued a hold rating, two have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $48.64.

Cognex Trading Up 1.0 %

CGNX opened at $36.94 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $6.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 40.59 and a beta of 1.53. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $39.23 and its 200-day moving average price is $47.71. Cognex Co. has a 12 month low of $34.28 and a 12 month high of $59.51.

Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 31st. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $0.10 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.09 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $197.24 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $190.30 million. Cognex had a return on equity of 8.90% and a net margin of 17.87%. Equities research analysts forecast that Cognex Co. will post 0.47 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Cognex Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 1st. Investors of record on Friday, November 17th will be issued a dividend of $0.075 per share. This represents a $0.30 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.81%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, November 16th. This is an increase from Cognex’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.07. Cognex’s payout ratio is currently 32.97%.

Cognex Company Profile

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process.