St. Louis Trust Co Lowers Stake in Apple Inc. $AAPL

St. Louis Trust Co lowered its stake in shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) by 94.9% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 939 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock after selling 17,338 shares during the quarter. St. Louis Trust Co’s holdings in Apple were worth $209,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Burkett Financial Services LLC raised its position in Apple by 0.6% in the 1st quarter. Burkett Financial Services LLC now owns 14,401 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $3,199,000 after purchasing an additional 93 shares during the period. Avid Wealth Partners LLC grew its holdings in Apple by 28.3% in the 1st quarter. Avid Wealth Partners LLC now owns 4,211 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $935,000 after acquiring an additional 930 shares during the last quarter. OneAscent Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in Apple by 4.6% in the 4th quarter. OneAscent Wealth Management LLC now owns 9,332 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $2,337,000 after acquiring an additional 409 shares during the last quarter. TruWealth Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Apple by 2.8% in the 1st quarter. TruWealth Advisors LLC now owns 189,282 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $42,045,000 after acquiring an additional 5,120 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Allstate Corp grew its holdings in Apple by 3,368.2% in the 4th quarter. Allstate Corp now owns 451,489 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $113,062,000 after acquiring an additional 438,471 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 67.73% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Deirdre O’brien sold 34,821 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $223.20, for a total transaction of $7,772,047.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 136,687 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $30,508,538.40. The trade was a 20.30% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 0.06% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

AAPL has been the topic of a number of research reports. Monness Crespi & Hardt lifted their target price on shares of Apple from $245.00 to $270.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 1st. Citigroup lifted their target price on shares of Apple from $240.00 to $245.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, August 1st. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $217.00 target price on shares of Apple in a research note on Tuesday, July 29th. UBS Group lifted their target price on shares of Apple from $210.00 to $220.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, August 1st. Finally, Bank of America reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $250.00 target price on shares of Apple in a research note on Monday, August 25th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, fifteen have given a Buy rating, eleven have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $237.37.

Apple Trading Down 0.2%

NASDAQ:AAPL opened at $232.14 on Monday. Apple Inc. has a one year low of $169.21 and a one year high of $260.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.25, a current ratio of 0.87 and a quick ratio of 0.83. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $215.79 and its 200 day simple moving average is $212.71. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.45 trillion, a P/E ratio of 35.23, a PEG ratio of 2.42 and a beta of 1.11.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 31st. The iPhone maker reported $1.57 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.43 by $0.14. The business had revenue of $94.04 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $88.64 billion. Apple had a net margin of 24.30% and a return on equity of 170.91%. Apple’s quarterly revenue was up 9.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.40 earnings per share. As a group, analysts forecast that Apple Inc. will post 7.28 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Apple Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 11th were paid a $0.26 dividend. This represents a $1.04 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, August 11th. Apple’s dividend payout ratio is currently 15.78%.

Apple Profile

Apple Inc designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables, and accessories worldwide. The company offers iPhone, a line of smartphones; Mac, a line of personal computers; iPad, a line of multi-purpose tablets; and wearables, home, and accessories comprising AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod.