Northwest Bank & Trust Co Acquires Shares of 6,786 Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

Northwest Bank & Trust Co acquired a new stake in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund acquired 6,786 shares of the asset manager’s stock, valued at approximately $888,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the business. UNIVEST FINANCIAL Corp grew its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.9% in the 4th quarter. UNIVEST FINANCIAL Corp now owns 3,320 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $435,000 after acquiring an additional 95 shares in the last quarter. Marino Stram & Associates LLC grew its position in shares of Blackstone by 3.8% in the 4th quarter. Marino Stram & Associates LLC now owns 2,592 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $339,000 after acquiring an additional 96 shares in the last quarter. FFT Wealth Management LLC grew its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.0% in the 4th quarter. FFT Wealth Management LLC now owns 5,094 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $667,000 after acquiring an additional 99 shares in the last quarter. Mayfair Advisory Group LLC grew its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.7% in the 4th quarter. Mayfair Advisory Group LLC now owns 3,776 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $484,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hartford Financial Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Blackstone by 23.0% in the 4th quarter. Hartford Financial Management Inc. now owns 534 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $70,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms recently issued reports on BX. Barclays restated an “equal weight” rating and set a $125.00 price objective (down previously from $129.00) on shares of Blackstone in a research report on Friday, April 19th. Piper Sandler reduced their price objective on Blackstone from $150.00 to $146.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th. Argus boosted their price objective on Blackstone from $133.00 to $135.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 24th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Blackstone from $144.00 to $145.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 17th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their target price on Blackstone from $135.00 to $138.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, April 12th. Thirteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $123.65.

Insider Activity

In other Blackstone news, Director Ruth Porat purchased 219 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, May 6th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $119.48 per share, with a total value of $26,166.12. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 34,445 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,115,488.60. The acquisition was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 1.00% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Blackstone Price Performance

Shares of Blackstone stock traded down $0.96 during trading on Friday, hitting $121.25. The stock had a trading volume of 1,685,481 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,907,827. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 0.79 and a quick ratio of 0.79. The firm has a market cap of $86.65 billion, a P/E ratio of 42.84, a PEG ratio of 1.02 and a beta of 1.53. The business has a fifty day moving average of $122.46 and a two-hundred day moving average of $123.77. Blackstone Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $87.40 and a fifty-two week high of $133.56.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 18th. The asset manager reported $0.98 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.98. Blackstone had a return on equity of 17.33% and a net margin of 20.84%. The business had revenue of $3.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.56 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.97 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 166.9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.77 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Cuts Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, May 6th. Stockholders of record on Monday, April 29th were issued a dividend of $0.83 per share. This represents a $3.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, April 26th. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is 117.31%.

About Blackstone

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.