Ball Corporation (NYSE:BALL) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

Shares of Ball Corporation (NYSE:BALL) have been given a consensus rating of “Hold” by the thirteen research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, six have issued a hold recommendation and six have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price target among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $62.3636.

Several research analysts have weighed in on BALL shares. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Ball in a research report on Friday. Royal Bank Of Canada boosted their price target on Ball from $69.00 to $70.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 7th. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their target price on Ball from $54.00 to $48.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, October 15th. Citigroup reduced their target price on Ball from $60.00 to $53.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, September 29th. Finally, Mizuho reduced their target price on Ball from $68.00 to $61.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, October 3rd.

Ball Stock Up 0.4%

NYSE:BALL opened at $49.88 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $13.57 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.84, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.14 and a beta of 1.09. Ball has a twelve month low of $43.51 and a twelve month high of $65.06. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $50.13 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $52.74. The company has a quick ratio of 0.67, a current ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.23.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 5th. The company reported $0.90 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.87 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $3.34 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.10 billion. Ball had a return on equity of 16.81% and a net margin of 4.49%.The business’s quarterly revenue was up 12.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.74 EPS. Ball has set its FY 2025 guidance at 3.550-3.650 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that Ball will post 3.48 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ball Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 16th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 2nd were paid a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.6%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, September 2nd. Ball’s payout ratio is currently 41.45%.

Insider Activity at Ball

In other news, Chairman Daniel William Fisher sold 3,400 shares of Ball stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, August 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $51.55, for a total transaction of $175,270.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chairman directly owned 10,036 shares in the company, valued at approximately $517,355.80. The trade was a 25.31% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Corporate insiders own 0.81% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its stake in Ball by 2.6% in the 2nd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 8,210,060 shares of the company’s stock valued at $460,502,000 after purchasing an additional 207,733 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in Ball by 5.1% in the 1st quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,370,274 shares of the company’s stock valued at $227,560,000 after purchasing an additional 210,838 shares during the period. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Ball in the 2nd quarter valued at $192,463,000. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its stake in Ball by 10.3% in the 1st quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 3,370,532 shares of the company’s stock valued at $175,480,000 after purchasing an additional 315,091 shares during the period. Finally, Northern Trust Corp boosted its stake in Ball by 0.7% in the 1st quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 3,046,342 shares of the company’s stock valued at $158,623,000 after purchasing an additional 19,921 shares during the period. 86.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Ball

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.