Lafayette Investments Inc. Decreases Holdings in Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:SASR)

Lafayette Investments Inc. decreased its stake in Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:SASR) by 2.9% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 43,503 shares of the bank’s stock after selling 1,282 shares during the quarter. Lafayette Investments Inc. owned approximately 0.10% of Sandy Spring Bancorp worth $1,060,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of SASR. Scarborough Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Sandy Spring Bancorp in the 4th quarter worth about $77,000. EntryPoint Capital LLC purchased a new position in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp in the first quarter valued at approximately $98,000. Hantz Financial Services Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp in the second quarter worth approximately $105,000. SG Americas Securities LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp during the first quarter worth approximately $122,000. Finally, CWM LLC raised its stake in Sandy Spring Bancorp by 59.4% in the 2nd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 5,561 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $135,000 after purchasing an additional 2,073 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 66.90% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have issued reports on SASR. StockNews.com cut shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. DA Davidson boosted their price target on shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp from $23.00 to $33.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 25th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods increased their price objective on shares of Sandy Spring Bancorp from $25.00 to $30.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Thursday, July 25th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and five have assigned a hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $27.00.

Sandy Spring Bancorp Price Performance

NASDAQ:SASR opened at $31.30 on Friday. Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. has a 52 week low of $19.27 and a 52 week high of $31.85. The stock’s fifty day moving average is $27.97 and its two-hundred day moving average is $24.13. The company has a market capitalization of $1.41 billion, a P/E ratio of 15.34 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a quick ratio of 1.02, a current ratio of 1.03 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54.

Sandy Spring Bancorp (NASDAQ:SASR) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The bank reported $0.51 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.43 by $0.08. Sandy Spring Bancorp had a net margin of 12.31% and a return on equity of 6.41%. The business had revenue of $184.70 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $99.60 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.60 EPS. Equities analysts expect that Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc. will post 1.93 EPS for the current year.

Sandy Spring Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, August 21st. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, August 14th were issued a dividend of $0.34 per share. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, August 14th. This represents a $1.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.35%. Sandy Spring Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 66.67%.

Sandy Spring Bancorp Company Profile

Sandy Spring Bancorp, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Sandy Spring Bank that provides commercial and retail banking, mortgage, private banking, and trust services to individuals and businesses in the United States. It offers financial products and services, including various loan and deposit products.