Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. Purchases 12,270 Shares of Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) by 1.4% during the second quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 871,415 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after buying an additional 12,270 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. owned 0.80% of Celanese worth $100,910,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. NorthRock Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Celanese in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $209,000. Global Retirement Partners LLC raised its position in shares of Celanese by 158.4% in the 1st quarter. Global Retirement Partners LLC now owns 323 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $33,000 after purchasing an additional 198 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC raised its position in shares of Celanese by 1.2% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 21,180 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $2,306,000 after purchasing an additional 247 shares during the last quarter. BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S raised its position in shares of Celanese by 55.0% in the 1st quarter. BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S now owns 2,161 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $235,000 after purchasing an additional 767 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. raised its position in shares of Celanese by 2.3% in the 1st quarter. Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. now owns 6,240 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $679,000 after purchasing an additional 140 shares during the last quarter. 98.87% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CE has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Celanese from $146.00 to $155.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, August 11th. Credit Suisse Group raised their price target on shares of Celanese from $100.00 to $111.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 8th. Piper Sandler cut shares of Celanese from a “neutral” rating to an “underweight” rating and decreased their price objective for the company from $120.00 to $112.00 in a research note on Tuesday, August 29th. StockNews.com cut shares of Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 4th. Finally, Citigroup lifted their price objective on shares of Celanese from $130.00 to $133.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 4th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $127.63.

Celanese Price Performance

Shares of NYSE CE opened at $130.57 on Tuesday. The firm has a market cap of $14.21 billion, a PE ratio of 7.04, a PEG ratio of 4.61 and a beta of 1.28. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $121.26 and a 200 day moving average of $118.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.77, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a current ratio of 1.63. Celanese Co. has a one year low of $97.12 and a one year high of $131.44.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, November 6th. The basic materials company reported $2.50 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.20 by $0.30. The company had revenue of $2.72 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.76 billion. Celanese had a net margin of 18.93% and a return on equity of 14.06%. The firm’s revenue was up 18.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $3.94 EPS. As a group, research analysts predict that Celanese Co. will post 9 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, November 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, October 30th were issued a dividend of $0.70 per share. This represents a $2.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.14%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 27th. Celanese’s payout ratio is 15.09%.

Celanese Company Profile

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.