Choate Investment Advisors Has $8.57 Million Stock Holdings in Costco Wholesale Co. (NASDAQ:COST)

Choate Investment Advisors boosted its holdings in shares of Costco Wholesale Co. (NASDAQ:COST) by 13.7% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 9,356 shares of the retailer’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,129 shares during the period. Choate Investment Advisors’ holdings in Costco Wholesale were worth $8,573,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Costco Wholesale by 1.2% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 2,808,255 shares of the retailer’s stock valued at $2,489,574,000 after purchasing an additional 32,074 shares during the last quarter. Nwam LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Costco Wholesale in the third quarter valued at about $20,056,000. CHURCHILL MANAGEMENT Corp purchased a new stake in Costco Wholesale during the fourth quarter worth about $8,430,000. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its holdings in Costco Wholesale by 15.0% during the fourth quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 7,662 shares of the retailer’s stock worth $7,020,000 after buying an additional 1,001 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Dale Q Rice Investment Management Ltd purchased a new stake in Costco Wholesale during the fourth quarter worth about $984,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 68.48% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms recently issued reports on COST. Roth Mkm raised their price objective on shares of Costco Wholesale from $755.00 to $907.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Loop Capital cut their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $1,150.00 to $1,135.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, March 7th. Jefferies Financial Group increased their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $1,050.00 to $1,145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 5th. DA Davidson increased their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $900.00 to $1,000.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, Evercore ISI increased their target price on shares of Costco Wholesale from $1,050.00 to $1,070.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 11th. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twenty-one have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Costco Wholesale presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $1,030.43.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Roland Michael Vachris sold 3,600 shares of Costco Wholesale stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $931.00, for a total value of $3,351,600.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 41,077 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $38,242,687. The trade was a 8.06 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 0.18% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Costco Wholesale Trading Up 1.5 %

COST stock opened at $903.92 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $401.25 billion, a PE ratio of 53.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 6.15 and a beta of 0.81. Costco Wholesale Co. has a one year low of $697.27 and a one year high of $1,078.24. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $989.80 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $944.47. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23, a quick ratio of 0.43 and a current ratio of 0.98.

Costco Wholesale (NASDAQ:COST) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, March 6th. The retailer reported $4.02 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $4.09 by ($0.07). Costco Wholesale had a return on equity of 32.31% and a net margin of 2.93%. The business had revenue of $63.72 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $63.02 billion. As a group, analysts predict that Costco Wholesale Co. will post 18.03 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Costco Wholesale Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 21st. Investors of record on Friday, February 7th were paid a $1.16 dividend. This represents a $4.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.51%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, February 7th. Costco Wholesale’s payout ratio is 27.09%.

Costco Wholesale Profile

Costco Wholesale Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the operation of membership warehouses in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada, Mexico, Japan, the United Kingdom, Korea, Australia, Taiwan, China, Spain, France, Iceland, New Zealand, and Sweden. The company offers branded and private-label products in a range of merchandise categories.