Celanese (NYSE:CE) Price Target Cut to $46.00 by Analysts at BMO Capital Markets

Celanese (NYSE:CE) had its target price decreased by BMO Capital Markets from $73.00 to $46.00 in a report issued on Thursday morning,Benzinga reports. BMO Capital Markets currently has an underperform rating on the basic materials company’s stock.

CE has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Morgan Stanley reduced their price objective on shares of Celanese from $100.00 to $80.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 13th. UBS Group downgraded shares of Celanese from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their price objective for the company from $161.00 to $97.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Vertical Research downgraded shares of Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $130.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Citigroup upgraded shares of Celanese to a “neutral” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $73.00 to $76.00 in a research report on Thursday, January 23rd. Finally, Barclays reduced their price target on shares of Celanese from $88.00 to $75.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Celanese has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $83.53.

Celanese Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:CE opened at $52.51 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.76, a current ratio of 1.37 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47. The company has a market cap of $5.74 billion, a P/E ratio of -3.77, a PEG ratio of 1.39 and a beta of 1.17. Celanese has a 52 week low of $51.51 and a 52 week high of $172.16. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $68.57 and a 200 day moving average price of $97.67.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 18th. The basic materials company reported $1.45 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.25 by $0.20. The firm had revenue of $2.37 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.36 billion. Celanese had a negative net margin of 14.81% and a positive return on equity of 12.01%. Research analysts predict that Celanese will post 8.79 earnings per share for the current year.

Celanese Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 31st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 25th will be paid a dividend of $0.03 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 25th. This represents a $0.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.23%. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is -20.10%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of CE. Dodge & Cox increased its stake in shares of Celanese by 100.3% during the 4th quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 13,618,062 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $942,506,000 after purchasing an additional 6,818,993 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Celanese in the 4th quarter worth approximately $222,815,000. Turtle Creek Asset Management Inc. grew its stake in Celanese by 266.7% in the 4th quarter. Turtle Creek Asset Management Inc. now owns 3,506,440 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $242,681,000 after acquiring an additional 2,550,334 shares during the period. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. grew its stake in Celanese by 4,506.7% in the 4th quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 2,344,661 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $162,274,000 after acquiring an additional 2,293,764 shares during the period. Finally, Wellington Management Group LLP grew its stake in Celanese by 27.4% in the 3rd quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 9,460,353 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,286,230,000 after acquiring an additional 2,036,362 shares during the period. 98.87% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.