Prudential Financial Inc. Grows Position in Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR)

Prudential Financial Inc. raised its position in Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR) by 202.8% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 171,173 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after buying an additional 114,634 shares during the period. Prudential Financial Inc.’s holdings in Pentair were worth $17,227,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Pentair by 0.7% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 20,216,366 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $2,034,575,000 after purchasing an additional 148,031 shares during the last quarter. Stevens Capital Management LP purchased a new stake in Pentair during the 4th quarter worth about $741,000. LPL Financial LLC boosted its position in shares of Pentair by 60.7% during the 4th quarter. LPL Financial LLC now owns 103,563 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $10,423,000 after acquiring an additional 39,134 shares in the last quarter. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS purchased a new position in shares of Pentair in the 4th quarter valued at about $6,075,000. Finally, Mizuho Securities USA LLC raised its position in shares of Pentair by 45.9% during the 4th quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC now owns 15,660 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,576,000 after acquiring an additional 4,928 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.37% of the company’s stock.

Pentair Stock Down 1.0 %

Shares of Pentair stock opened at $89.19 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $14.70 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.85, a PEG ratio of 1.87 and a beta of 1.23. Pentair plc has a one year low of $72.63 and a one year high of $110.71. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $94.86 and a two-hundred day moving average of $98.69. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.46, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a current ratio of 1.60.

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The industrial products company reported $1.08 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.02 by $0.06. Pentair had a return on equity of 20.94% and a net margin of 15.32%. The firm had revenue of $972.90 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $970.95 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.87 earnings per share. Pentair’s revenue was down 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts forecast that Pentair plc will post 4.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Pentair Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 2nd. Investors of record on Friday, April 18th will be paid a $0.25 dividend. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.12%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. Pentair’s payout ratio is currently 26.74%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on PNR. Robert W. Baird upgraded shares of Pentair from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $114.00 price target on the stock in a research note on Tuesday. StockNews.com raised shares of Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. Northcoast Research raised shares of Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th. Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on Pentair from $126.00 to $125.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 24th. Finally, Citigroup reduced their target price on Pentair from $126.00 to $119.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 13th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have issued a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $112.27.

Pentair Profile

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets.