Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. Sells 211 Shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL)

Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. reduced its position in Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) by 1.5% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 13,514 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 211 shares during the period. Sumitomo Life Insurance Co.’s holdings in Ecolab were worth $3,167,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in ECL. Farther Finance Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Ecolab by 32.7% during the third quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 2,356 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $602,000 after buying an additional 581 shares during the last quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. boosted its holdings in shares of Ecolab by 15.9% during the 3rd quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 6,224 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,589,000 after acquiring an additional 855 shares during the last quarter. PFW Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Ecolab in the fourth quarter worth approximately $1,262,000. Nordea Investment Management AB raised its holdings in shares of Ecolab by 8.7% during the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 1,627,017 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $381,552,000 after purchasing an additional 129,635 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB lifted its position in Ecolab by 797.3% during the third quarter. Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB now owns 17,820 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $4,550,000 after purchasing an additional 15,834 shares during the period. 74.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have commented on ECL. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Ecolab from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $263.00 to $280.00 in a research report on Tuesday. Piper Sandler cut their price objective on Ecolab from $305.00 to $270.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. BMO Capital Markets raised Ecolab from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and increased their target price for the company from $279.00 to $290.00 in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Royal Bank of Canada cut their price target on Ecolab from $306.00 to $294.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, January 10th. Finally, Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $260.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, November 18th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Ecolab has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $278.60.

Ecolab Trading Up 1.4 %

Ecolab stock opened at $249.71 on Wednesday. Ecolab Inc. has a 1 year low of $195.49 and a 1 year high of $262.61. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $241.23 and its 200-day moving average price is $245.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 1.30 and a quick ratio of 0.97. The stock has a market cap of $70.71 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.02, a PEG ratio of 2.68 and a beta of 1.13.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The basic materials company reported $1.83 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.82 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $4 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.03 billion. Ecolab had a net margin of 13.05% and a return on equity of 22.12%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.54 EPS. On average, equities analysts predict that Ecolab Inc. will post 6.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ecolab Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 15th. Investors of record on Tuesday, December 17th were given a $0.65 dividend. This is an increase from Ecolab’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.57. This represents a $2.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.04%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, December 17th. Ecolab’s payout ratio is currently 36.47%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Ecolab

In other news, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 70,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $245.95, for a total transaction of $17,216,500.00. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 29,178,741 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,176,511,348.95. This represents a 0.24 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Insiders sold 834,566 shares of company stock worth $205,225,417 in the last quarter. 0.04% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Ecolab Profile

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.