Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) Shares Down 4.6% on Analyst Downgrade

Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) was down 4.6% during mid-day trading on Wednesday after Barclays lowered their price target on the stock from $101.00 to $91.00. Barclays currently has an equal weight rating on the stock. Crown Castle traded as low as $87.61 and last traded at $87.6020. Approximately 1,912,349 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 47% from the average daily volume of 3,576,674 shares. The stock had previously closed at $91.86.

Several other brokerages have also commented on CCI. Jefferies Financial Group decreased their target price on Crown Castle from $90.00 to $84.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 4th. HSBC reduced their price objective on Crown Castle from $107.00 to $88.40 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 5th. New Street Research lowered shares of Crown Castle from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $93.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Monday, January 5th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $105.00 to $90.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, Citigroup decreased their price target on shares of Crown Castle from $110.00 to $106.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 5th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have assigned a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $100.02.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Crown Castle

Hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the business. EP Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Crown Castle during the fourth quarter worth approximately $507,000. NewEdge Advisors LLC raised its stake in Crown Castle by 5.7% during the 4th quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 32,284 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $2,869,000 after acquiring an additional 1,732 shares in the last quarter. Empowered Funds LLC raised its stake in Crown Castle by 87.9% during the 4th quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 43,305 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $3,849,000 after acquiring an additional 20,260 shares in the last quarter. XTX Topco Ltd acquired a new position in Crown Castle during the 4th quarter worth $8,389,000. Finally, Zacks Investment Management grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 64.6% in the fourth quarter. Zacks Investment Management now owns 484,432 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $43,051,000 after purchasing an additional 190,193 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 90.77% of the company’s stock.

Crown Castle Price Performance

The business has a fifty day moving average price of $87.23 and a 200 day moving average price of $92.63. The company has a market capitalization of $38.11 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 86.64, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.46 and a beta of 0.96.

Crown Castle Company Profile

Crown Castle is a U.S.-focused communications infrastructure company organized as a real estate investment trust (REIT) that owns, operates and leases shared wireless infrastructure. Its primary business consists of providing tower-based site leases, small cell networks and fiber solutions that support mobile voice and data transmission for wireless carriers, cable companies and other enterprise customers. The company’s assets are positioned to enable network coverage and capacity, including the densification projects associated with 4G LTE and 5G deployments.

Its product and service offerings include ground-based tower sites that host multiple wireless operators, distributed small cell nodes and associated fiber backhaul used to connect sites into carrier networks, and site development and maintenance services.