Patton Albertson Miller Group LLC Trims Stock Holdings in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

Patton Albertson Miller Group LLC lowered its holdings in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) by 2.0% in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 40,002 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 834 shares during the period. Patton Albertson Miller Group LLC’s holdings in Celanese were worth $5,439,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. DT Investment Partners LLC boosted its holdings in Celanese by 128.8% in the third quarter. DT Investment Partners LLC now owns 183 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $25,000 after purchasing an additional 103 shares during the last quarter. Fairscale Capital LLC purchased a new position in Celanese in the second quarter valued at about $28,000. LRI Investments LLC bought a new position in Celanese during the 1st quarter worth approximately $31,000. Key Financial Inc lifted its holdings in Celanese by 3,933.3% during the 2nd quarter. Key Financial Inc now owns 242 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $33,000 after buying an additional 236 shares during the last quarter. Finally, ORG Partners LLC bought a new position in Celanese during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $40,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.87% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

CE has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Bank of America reduced their target price on Celanese from $137.00 to $128.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, August 12th. KeyCorp downgraded Celanese from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Monday, October 7th. Mizuho reduced their target price on Celanese from $132.00 to $120.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on Celanese from $140.00 to $100.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, November 6th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Celanese from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $156.00 to $130.00 in a research report on Monday, August 5th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $120.59.

Celanese Stock Up 2.5 %

CE opened at $76.54 on Tuesday. Celanese Co. has a 12 month low of $71.38 and a 12 month high of $172.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 0.76. The stock has a market cap of $8.37 billion, a P/E ratio of 7.70, a P/E/G ratio of 0.77 and a beta of 1.31. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $116.72 and its 200 day moving average price is $130.56.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last posted its earnings results on Monday, November 4th. The basic materials company reported $2.44 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.85 by ($0.41). Celanese had a net margin of 10.40% and a return on equity of 13.17%. The business had revenue of $2.65 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.70 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.50 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was down 2.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that Celanese Co. will post 8.67 earnings per share for the current year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, November 13th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, October 30th were given a dividend of $0.70 per share. This represents a $2.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.66%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, October 30th. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 28.17%.

About Celanese

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.