Sovran Advisors LLC Invests $63,000 in Redwood Trust, Inc. (NYSE:RWT)

Sovran Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Redwood Trust, Inc. (NYSE:RWT) in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund acquired 10,000 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock, valued at approximately $63,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its stake in Redwood Trust by 65.4% in the third quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 5,169 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $40,000 after buying an additional 2,043 shares during the last quarter. Creative Planning bought a new stake in Redwood Trust in the 3rd quarter valued at about $91,000. Clear Harbor Asset Management LLC acquired a new position in Redwood Trust during the 3rd quarter valued at about $722,000. Golden State Equity Partners boosted its stake in Redwood Trust by 19.3% during the 3rd quarter. Golden State Equity Partners now owns 70,562 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $545,000 after purchasing an additional 11,396 shares during the period. Finally, Ceredex Value Advisors LLC grew its position in Redwood Trust by 22.8% in the 3rd quarter. Ceredex Value Advisors LLC now owns 1,113,600 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $8,608,000 after purchasing an additional 207,088 shares during the last quarter. 74.34% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on RWT shares. JMP Securities cut their price target on Redwood Trust from $9.00 to $8.00 and set a “market outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 23rd. StockNews.com raised Redwood Trust from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price target on Redwood Trust from $7.00 to $6.50 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 21st. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $7.84.

Redwood Trust Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE RWT opened at $6.46 on Friday. Redwood Trust, Inc. has a 1 year low of $5.45 and a 1 year high of $8.15. The firm has a market cap of $856.34 million, a P/E ratio of 11.75 and a beta of 1.57. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $6.59 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $7.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 14.55, a quick ratio of 44.36 and a current ratio of 44.36.

Redwood Trust (NYSE:RWT) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.13 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.16 by ($0.03). Redwood Trust had a net margin of 9.35% and a return on equity of 6.01%. Research analysts forecast that Redwood Trust, Inc. will post 0.55 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Redwood Trust Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 30th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 23rd were paid a $0.18 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, December 23rd. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 11.14%. This is a boost from Redwood Trust’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.17. Redwood Trust’s payout ratio is currently 130.91%.

Redwood Trust Profile

Redwood Trust, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a specialty finance company in the United States. The company operates through three segments: Residential Consumer Mortgage Banking, Residential Investor Mortgage Banking, and Investment Portfolio. The Residential Consumer Mortgage Banking segment operates a mortgage loan conduit that acquires residential loans from third-party originators for subsequent sale, securitization, or transfer to its investment portfolio.