Berkeley Capital Partners LLC Makes New $886,000 Investment in Smurfit Westrock PLC $SW

Berkeley Capital Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW) in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund acquired 20,810 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $886,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Ethic Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 0.6% in the second quarter. Ethic Inc. now owns 41,103 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,770,000 after buying an additional 254 shares during the period. Benjamin Edwards Inc. raised its holdings in Smurfit Westrock by 4.1% in the 2nd quarter. Benjamin Edwards Inc. now owns 6,776 shares of the company’s stock valued at $292,000 after acquiring an additional 264 shares in the last quarter. AXA S.A. lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 1.3% during the 2nd quarter. AXA S.A. now owns 22,283 shares of the company’s stock valued at $962,000 after acquiring an additional 285 shares during the period. Penserra Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 12.6% during the 2nd quarter. Penserra Capital Management LLC now owns 2,779 shares of the company’s stock valued at $119,000 after acquiring an additional 312 shares during the period. Finally, TD Waterhouse Canada Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 113.3% during the 3rd quarter. TD Waterhouse Canada Inc. now owns 640 shares of the company’s stock worth $27,000 after purchasing an additional 340 shares in the last quarter. 83.38% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently commented on SW. Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $61.00 price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research note on Wednesday. Zacks Research upgraded shares of Smurfit Westrock from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, January 9th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $58.00 price target on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research report on Thursday, February 12th. Truist Financial set a $60.00 price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research note on Thursday, February 12th. Finally, Weiss Ratings restated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Ten investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $57.20.

Smurfit Westrock Price Performance

SW stock opened at $49.77 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $26.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 37.42 and a beta of 1.09. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a current ratio of 1.48 and a quick ratio of 0.95. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $42.37 and a 200 day simple moving average of $41.44. Smurfit Westrock PLC has a 1 year low of $32.73 and a 1 year high of $55.16.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 11th. The company reported $0.34 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.46 by ($0.12). The company had revenue of $7.58 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.63 billion. Smurfit Westrock had a return on equity of 6.10% and a net margin of 2.24%.The business’s quarterly revenue was up .5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.28 EPS. Research analysts anticipate that Smurfit Westrock PLC will post 3.25 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Smurfit Westrock Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 18th. Investors of record on Tuesday, February 17th will be given a dividend of $0.4523 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 17th. This represents a $1.81 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.6%. This is an increase from Smurfit Westrock’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.43. Smurfit Westrock’s dividend payout ratio is presently 136.09%.

About Smurfit Westrock

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.