Arizona State Retirement System Reduces Stock Position in The Progressive Corporation $PGR

Arizona State Retirement System reduced its position in shares of The Progressive Corporation (NYSE:PGR) by 4.1% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 164,244 shares of the insurance provider’s stock after selling 6,982 shares during the period. Arizona State Retirement System’s holdings in Progressive were worth $37,402,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of PGR. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Progressive by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 54,667,528 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $13,500,146,000 after purchasing an additional 151,240 shares during the period. State Street Corp lifted its position in shares of Progressive by 0.3% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 25,808,762 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $6,373,474,000 after purchasing an additional 78,374 shares during the period. Capital International Investors lifted its position in shares of Progressive by 78.9% in the 3rd quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 13,704,197 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $3,384,082,000 after purchasing an additional 6,045,732 shares during the period. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its position in shares of Progressive by 26.1% in the 3rd quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 11,167,940 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $2,757,905,000 after purchasing an additional 2,314,864 shares during the period. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc lifted its position in shares of Progressive by 4.9% in the 3rd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 4,196,111 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $1,036,230,000 after purchasing an additional 197,603 shares during the period. 85.34% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Activity at Progressive

In other news, insider Maribel Pumarejo sold 739 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $203.25, for a total transaction of $150,201.75. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, CIO Jonathan S. Bauer sold 2,266 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $203.05, for a total transaction of $460,111.30. Following the transaction, the executive directly owned 26,250 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,330,062.50. The trade was a 7.95% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold 6,933 shares of company stock valued at $1,441,564 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.32% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have commented on the company. Piper Sandler reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $259.00 price objective on shares of Progressive in a research report on Monday, March 2nd. Evercore reissued a “negative” rating on shares of Progressive in a research report on Wednesday, March 18th. HSBC lowered Progressive from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, January 16th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Progressive in a research report on Friday, March 27th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price objective on Progressive from $227.00 to $210.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, April 7th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, fourteen have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Progressive presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $238.39.

Progressive Price Performance

Shares of NYSE PGR opened at $205.38 on Friday. The Progressive Corporation has a twelve month low of $192.02 and a twelve month high of $289.96. The firm has a market cap of $120.14 billion, a P/E ratio of 10.44, a PEG ratio of 6.68 and a beta of 0.34. The company has a 50 day moving average of $203.46 and a 200 day moving average of $213.78. The company has a quick ratio of 0.35, a current ratio of 0.33 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.26.

Progressive (NYSE:PGR) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 15th. The insurance provider reported $4.80 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.67 by $0.13. Progressive had a net margin of 12.92% and a return on equity of 33.47%. The company had revenue of $22.19 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $23.51 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $4.37 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.5% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts expect that The Progressive Corporation will post 16.39 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Progressive Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, April 10th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 2nd were issued a dividend of $0.10 per share. This represents a $0.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.2%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 2nd. Progressive’s payout ratio is presently 2.03%.

Progressive Company Profile

Progressive Corporation is a large U.S.-based property and casualty insurer that primarily underwrites personal auto insurance along with a broad suite of related products. Its offerings include coverage for private passenger automobiles, commercial auto fleets, motorcycles, boats and recreational vehicles, as well as homeowners, renters, umbrella and other specialty P&C products. Progressive also provides claims handling, risk management and related services to individual and commercial policyholders.

The company distributes its products through a mix of direct channels—online and by phone—and an extensive independent agent network.