West Family Investments Inc. Takes $210,000 Position in Target Co. (NYSE:TGT)

West Family Investments Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Target Co. (NYSE:TGT) in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 1,349 shares of the retailer’s stock, valued at approximately $210,000.

A number of other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Triad Wealth Partners LLC bought a new stake in shares of Target during the second quarter worth $25,000. Slocum Gordon & Co LLP bought a new stake in Target during the 2nd quarter valued at about $28,000. Hobbs Group Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in Target in the 2nd quarter valued at about $31,000. Wolff Wiese Magana LLC grew its stake in Target by 156.5% in the 3rd quarter. Wolff Wiese Magana LLC now owns 218 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $34,000 after acquiring an additional 133 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. bought a new position in Target in the 2nd quarter worth about $37,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.73% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on TGT. Sanford C. Bernstein assumed coverage on Target in a report on Tuesday, October 22nd. They issued a “market perform” rating and a $168.00 price target for the company. Citigroup lifted their target price on Target from $180.00 to $188.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 22nd. Daiwa Capital Markets raised Target from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $170.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Monday, August 26th. StockNews.com lowered Target from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 12th. Finally, Bank of America upped their price objective on shares of Target from $190.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 22nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating, twenty have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $179.47.

Target Stock Performance

Shares of Target stock opened at $156.00 on Wednesday. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $152.84 and a 200 day moving average price of $150.32. The firm has a market capitalization of $71.87 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.12, a PEG ratio of 1.98 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a quick ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 0.90 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.95. Target Co. has a 52 week low of $128.37 and a 52 week high of $181.86.

Target (NYSE:TGT) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 21st. The retailer reported $2.57 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.18 by $0.39. Target had a net margin of 4.18% and a return on equity of 33.10%. The business had revenue of $25.02 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $25.19 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $1.80 EPS. Target’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts expect that Target Co. will post 9.55 EPS for the current year.

Target Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, December 10th. Investors of record on Wednesday, November 20th will be given a $1.12 dividend. This represents a $4.48 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.87%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, November 20th. Target’s payout ratio is 46.28%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, insider Richard H. Gomez sold 6,348 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, September 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $157.17, for a total value of $997,715.16. Following the sale, the insider now owns 123,551 shares in the company, valued at $19,418,510.67. This represents a 4.89 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CAO Matthew A. Liegel sold 1,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, August 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $153.13, for a total transaction of $153,130.00. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 7,276 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,114,173.88. This trade represents a 12.08 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 52,348 shares of company stock worth $8,290,995 in the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.15% of the company’s stock.

Target Company Profile

Target Corporation operates as a general merchandise retailer in the United States. The company offers apparel for women, men, boys, girls, toddlers, and infants and newborns, as well as jewelry, accessories, and shoes; and beauty and personal care, baby gear, cleaning, paper products, and pet supplies.