Brokerages Set Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT) Price Target at $87.67

Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT) has been given an average recommendation of “Hold” by the five research firms that are covering the firm, MarketBeat.com reports. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating on the company. The average 1-year price objective among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $90.17.

CBT has been the subject of a number of research reports. StockNews.com lowered shares of Cabot from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. UBS Group downgraded shares of Cabot from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their price target for the company from $90.00 to $87.00 in a research note on Monday, January 8th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft downgraded shares of Cabot from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and increased their target price for the company from $88.00 to $95.00 in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Mizuho assumed coverage on shares of Cabot in a research note on Wednesday, March 27th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $104.00 target price on the stock.

Insider Activity at Cabot

In related news, EVP Jeff Ji Zhu sold 55,233 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $79.91, for a total value of $4,413,669.03. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 97,201 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,767,331.91. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 3.07% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Cabot

A number of institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of CBT. BlackRock Inc. increased its holdings in Cabot by 11.0% in the 1st quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 6,931,530 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $474,186,000 after acquiring an additional 686,769 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in Cabot by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 6,361,129 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $440,635,000 after acquiring an additional 24,961 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its holdings in Cabot by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 4,908,495 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $340,011,000 after acquiring an additional 20,589 shares in the last quarter. Earnest Partners LLC increased its holdings in Cabot by 2.1% in the 3rd quarter. Earnest Partners LLC now owns 3,167,091 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $219,384,000 after acquiring an additional 66,422 shares in the last quarter. Finally, State Street Corp grew its holdings in shares of Cabot by 3.1% during the first quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,915,557 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $146,808,000 after buying an additional 56,765 shares in the last quarter. 93.18% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Cabot Price Performance

NYSE:CBT opened at $92.01 on Thursday. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $88.31 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $79.74. The company has a quick ratio of 1.30, a current ratio of 2.04 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74. Cabot has a 52 week low of $63.73 and a 52 week high of $98.34. The stock has a market cap of $5.10 billion, a PE ratio of 11.95, a P/E/G ratio of 0.96 and a beta of 1.28.

Cabot (NYSE:CBT) last issued its earnings results on Monday, February 5th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.56 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.49 by $0.07. Cabot had a net margin of 11.24% and a return on equity of 25.52%. The firm had revenue of $958.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $927.28 million. As a group, analysts forecast that Cabot will post 6.58 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Cabot Company Profile

Cabot Corporation operates as a specialty chemicals and performance materials company. The company operates through two segments, Reinforcement Materials and Performance Chemicals. It offers reinforcing carbons that are used in tires as a rubber reinforcing agent and performance additive, as well as in industrial products, such as hoses, belts, extruded profiles, and molded goods; and engineered elastomer composites solutions.