Brookstone Capital Management Raises Holdings in FMC Co. (NYSE:FMC)

Brookstone Capital Management increased its position in FMC Co. (NYSE:FMC) by 9.4% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 164,887 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after acquiring an additional 14,197 shares during the quarter. Brookstone Capital Management owned about 0.13% of FMC worth $8,015,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in FMC. State Street Corp increased its stake in shares of FMC by 27.3% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 6,271,760 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $417,151,000 after purchasing an additional 1,343,615 shares in the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in FMC by 317.7% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,099,389 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $63,160,000 after buying an additional 836,179 shares during the period. Ilex Capital Partners UK LLP grew its stake in FMC by 2,129.4% in the 3rd quarter. Ilex Capital Partners UK LLP now owns 440,353 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $29,037,000 after buying an additional 420,601 shares in the last quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC raised its holdings in FMC by 2,531.3% during the 3rd quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC now owns 253,179 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $16,695,000 after acquiring an additional 243,557 shares during the period. Finally, Federated Hermes Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of FMC during the second quarter worth $13,492,000. 91.86% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

FMC Stock Up 4.9 %

Shares of NYSE FMC opened at $52.03 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $6.50 billion, a P/E ratio of 4.48, a PEG ratio of 1.41 and a beta of 0.83. FMC Co. has a one year low of $47.71 and a one year high of $68.72. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $54.51 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $59.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.65, a current ratio of 1.48 and a quick ratio of 1.09.

FMC (NYSE:FMC) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The basic materials company reported $0.69 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.49 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $1.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.04 billion. FMC had a net margin of 34.93% and a return on equity of 7.68%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 8.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.44 EPS. As a group, analysts expect that FMC Co. will post 3.35 EPS for the current fiscal year.

FMC Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 16th. Investors of record on Tuesday, December 31st will be issued a dividend of $0.58 per share. This represents a $2.32 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.46%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, December 31st. FMC’s dividend payout ratio is presently 19.97%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts recently issued reports on FMC shares. KeyCorp decreased their price objective on FMC from $79.00 to $69.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on shares of FMC from $78.00 to $81.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Mizuho decreased their target price on shares of FMC from $70.00 to $55.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. Citigroup cut their price target on shares of FMC from $70.00 to $55.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price target on shares of FMC from $75.00 to $66.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, December 20th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating, three have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $62.92.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other FMC news, VP Jacqueline Scanlan sold 4,529 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, November 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.67, for a total transaction of $270,245.43. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now owns 28,649 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,709,485.83. This represents a 13.65 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. 0.85% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

FMC Company Profile

FMC Corporation, an agricultural sciences company, provides crop protection, plant health, and professional pest and turf management products. It develops, markets, and sells crop protection chemicals that includes insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides; and biologicals, crop nutrition, and seed treatment products, which are used in agriculture to enhance crop yield and quality by controlling a range of insects, weeds, and diseases, as well as in non-agricultural markets for pest control.