Cerity Partners LLC Buys Shares of 4,592 Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR)

Cerity Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 4,592 shares of the industrial products company’s stock, valued at approximately $333,000.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Lord Abbett & CO. LLC bought a new position in shares of Pentair during the third quarter valued at approximately $21,044,000. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its position in Pentair by 228.1% during the fourth quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 373,082 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $27,127,000 after purchasing an additional 259,385 shares in the last quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board purchased a new position in Pentair in the third quarter valued at about $14,763,000. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Pentair by 1.0% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 19,882,068 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,287,364,000 after purchasing an additional 204,416 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Impax Asset Management Group plc boosted its holdings in shares of Pentair by 1.3% in the 4th quarter. Impax Asset Management Group plc now owns 9,897,479 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $718,440,000 after buying an additional 131,745 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.37% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Citigroup raised their price objective on Pentair from $85.00 to $101.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, April 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $91.00 target price on shares of Pentair in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Mizuho increased their price target on Pentair from $82.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 7th. BNP Paribas began coverage on shares of Pentair in a research report on Tuesday, March 12th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $86.00 target price on the stock. Finally, StockNews.com lowered Pentair from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, February 2nd. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $89.93.

Pentair Stock Up 1.0 %

NYSE PNR opened at $79.96 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.94, a current ratio of 1.90 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.63. Pentair plc has a 52 week low of $53.88 and a 52 week high of $85.81. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $80.35 and its 200-day simple moving average is $71.89. The firm has a market cap of $13.28 billion, a PE ratio of 21.27, a P/E/G ratio of 1.50 and a beta of 1.20.

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The industrial products company reported $0.94 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.90 by $0.04. Pentair had a net margin of 15.30% and a return on equity of 20.16%. The company had revenue of $1.02 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.01 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.91 earnings per share. Pentair’s quarterly revenue was down 1.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Pentair plc will post 4.21 earnings per share for the current year.

Pentair Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 3rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 19th will be paid a dividend of $0.23 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 18th. This represents a $0.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.15%. Pentair’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 24.47%.

About Pentair

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets.