Federated Hermes Inc. Lowers Stake in Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT)

Federated Hermes Inc. cut its stake in Cabot Co. (NYSE:CBT) by 11.4% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 6,120 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock after selling 791 shares during the quarter. Federated Hermes Inc.’s holdings in Cabot were worth $511,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in CBT. Arlington Trust Co LLC purchased a new position in Cabot in the fourth quarter valued at about $34,000. Milestone Investment Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Cabot during the 3rd quarter worth about $79,000. NBC Securities Inc. purchased a new stake in Cabot during the 3rd quarter valued at about $162,000. Blue Trust Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Cabot by 33.4% in the fourth quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 2,527 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $211,000 after purchasing an additional 632 shares during the period. Finally, Quadrature Capital Ltd purchased a new position in shares of Cabot in the third quarter worth about $215,000. 93.18% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CBT has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Mizuho started coverage on Cabot in a research report on Wednesday, March 27th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $104.00 target price on the stock. StockNews.com lowered shares of Cabot from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 14th. UBS Group downgraded shares of Cabot from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $90.00 to $87.00 in a research report on Monday, January 8th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft downgraded Cabot from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and increased their price target for the stock from $88.00 to $95.00 in a research report on Thursday, April 18th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Cabot has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $90.17.

Cabot Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE CBT opened at $94.10 on Friday. Cabot Co. has a 1 year low of $63.73 and a 1 year high of $98.34. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74, a quick ratio of 1.30 and a current ratio of 2.04. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $90.34 and its 200 day moving average price is $81.17. The company has a market capitalization of $5.22 billion, a PE ratio of 12.22, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.97 and a beta of 1.27.

Cabot (NYSE:CBT) last posted its earnings results on Monday, February 5th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.49 by $0.07. Cabot had a net margin of 11.24% and a return on equity of 25.52%. The business had revenue of $958.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $927.28 million. On average, research analysts predict that Cabot Co. will post 6.58 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Cabot

In other news, EVP Jeff Ji Zhu sold 55,233 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $79.91, for a total transaction 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 filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 3.07% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Cabot 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.