Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) Sees Large Increase in Short Interest

Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) saw a large increase in short interest in the month of January. As of January 15th, there was short interest totalling 6,310,000 shares, an increase of 22.8% from the December 31st total of 5,140,000 shares. Currently, 5.8% of the company’s shares are sold short. Based on an average daily volume of 2,360,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 2.7 days.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Celanese

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the company. DT Investment Partners LLC increased its holdings in shares of Celanese by 128.8% in the third quarter. DT Investment Partners LLC now owns 183 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $25,000 after purchasing an additional 103 shares during the last quarter. UMB Bank n.a. raised its holdings in Celanese by 103.7% in the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 381 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $26,000 after acquiring an additional 194 shares during the period. Mather Group LLC. lifted its position in Celanese by 124.0% during the third quarter. Mather Group LLC. now owns 401 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $55,000 after acquiring an additional 222 shares during the last quarter. CKW Financial Group boosted its holdings in shares of Celanese by 52.9% during the fourth quarter. CKW Financial Group now owns 535 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $37,000 after acquiring an additional 185 shares during the period. Finally, Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt grew its position in shares of Celanese by 1,395.3% in the third quarter. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt now owns 643 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $87,000 after purchasing an additional 600 shares during the last quarter. 98.87% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Celanese Stock Up 1.7 %

Shares of Celanese stock opened at $72.17 on Friday. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $70.22 and its 200 day simple moving average is $105.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a current ratio of 1.37. The firm has a market cap of $7.89 billion, a PE ratio of 7.26, a P/E/G ratio of 1.46 and a beta of 1.18. Celanese has a 52-week low of $64.05 and a 52-week high of $172.16.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 4th. The basic materials company reported $2.44 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.85 by ($0.41). The company had revenue of $2.65 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.70 billion. Celanese had a return on equity of 13.17% and a net margin of 10.40%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $2.50 EPS. On average, analysts predict that Celanese will post 8.11 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have recently commented on CE. Piper Sandler lowered their price target on shares of Celanese from $98.00 to $77.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. Wells Fargo & Company cut shares of Celanese from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $165.00 to $115.00 in a research report on Tuesday, November 5th. Bank of America upgraded Celanese from an “underperform” rating to a “buy” rating and reduced their price target for the stock from $95.00 to $88.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. KeyCorp downgraded Celanese from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Monday, October 7th. Finally, Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on Celanese from $100.00 to $80.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, January 13th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Celanese presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $102.82.

About Celanese

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.