Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE:BRO) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

Shares of Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE:BRO) have been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the eighteen research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat reports. Fifteen analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and three have given a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price target among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $90.6429.

BRO has been the subject of several analyst reports. UBS Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $81.00 target price (down from $90.00) on shares of Brown & Brown in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. Bank of America decreased their price objective on Brown & Brown from $94.00 to $90.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 27th. Barclays dropped their price target on Brown & Brown from $83.00 to $82.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 27th. Mizuho reduced their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $90.00 to $84.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 28th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Brown & Brown in a research report on Monday, December 29th.

Institutional Trading of Brown & Brown

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in BRO. Federation des caisses Desjardins du Quebec grew its holdings in shares of Brown & Brown by 31.1% in the fourth quarter. Federation des caisses Desjardins du Quebec now owns 10,533 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $839,000 after purchasing an additional 2,501 shares in the last quarter. HRT Financial LP purchased a new stake in shares of Brown & Brown during the fourth quarter worth $2,097,000. Brooklyn Investment Group increased its position in shares of Brown & Brown by 5.9% during the fourth quarter. Brooklyn Investment Group now owns 17,290 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,398,000 after acquiring an additional 961 shares during the period. Orion Porfolio Solutions LLC raised its stake in shares of Brown & Brown by 18.3% in the fourth quarter. Orion Porfolio Solutions LLC now owns 3,529 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $281,000 after acquiring an additional 545 shares in the last quarter. Finally, XXI Wealth LLC purchased a new position in Brown & Brown in the fourth quarter valued at $309,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 71.01% of the company’s stock.

Brown & Brown Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE BRO opened at $69.44 on Friday. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $77.58 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $85.34. The stock has a market cap of $23.71 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.70, a PEG ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 0.79. The company has a current ratio of 1.67, a quick ratio of 2.10 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. Brown & Brown has a 12 month low of $65.68 and a 12 month high of $125.68.

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) last issued its earnings results on Monday, January 26th. The financial services provider reported $0.93 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.91 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.61 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. Brown & Brown had a net margin of 17.84% and a return on equity of 12.93%. The firm’s revenue was up 35.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.86 earnings per share. As a group, analysts predict that Brown & Brown will post 4.18 earnings per share for the current year.

Brown & Brown Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, February 11th. Investors of record on Wednesday, February 4th were paid a dividend of $0.165 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, February 4th. This represents a $0.66 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.0%. Brown & Brown’s dividend payout ratio is presently 20.63%.

About Brown & Brown

Brown & Brown, Inc (NYSE: BRO) is a professional insurance brokerage and risk advisory firm that provides a broad range of property and casualty, employee benefits, personal risk, and specialty insurance products. The company works with commercial, public sector and individual clients to design and place insurance programs, manage claims and loss control, and deliver risk management consulting. Its services also include wholesale brokerage, program administration and other specialty distribution solutions that connect carriers and intermediaries to niche markets.

Brown & Brown operates through a decentralized model of operating units and subsidiaries, enabling local client service with the scale to access national and specialty markets.