Quaker Chemical Co. (NYSE:KWR) Short Interest Update

Quaker Chemical Co. (NYSE:KWR) was the target of a significant decline in short interest in March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 1,090,000 shares, a decline of 6.8% from the March 15th total of 1,170,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 81,200 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 13.4 days. Approximately 7.9% of the company’s stock are short sold.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Quaker Chemical

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. BlackRock Inc. grew its position in shares of Quaker Chemical by 0.5% during the second quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 2,218,698 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $432,424,000 after acquiring an additional 11,574 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in Quaker Chemical by 0.7% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 1,599,027 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $341,264,000 after purchasing an additional 11,807 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its holdings in Quaker Chemical by 7.4% in the second quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 1,359,780 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $203,314,000 after purchasing an additional 93,539 shares during the period. Morgan Stanley lifted its holdings in Quaker Chemical by 14.8% in the third quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 701,629 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $112,261,000 after purchasing an additional 90,470 shares during the period. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its holdings in Quaker Chemical by 13.3% in the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 681,245 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $108,999,000 after purchasing an additional 80,043 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 77.46% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms have recently commented on KWR. StockNews.com raised shares of Quaker Chemical from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price target on shares of Quaker Chemical from $200.00 to $223.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, March 4th.

Quaker Chemical Stock Performance

KWR stock traded down $1.18 during trading on Wednesday, hitting $190.88. 52,422 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 63,042. The company has a quick ratio of 1.89, a current ratio of 2.52 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. Quaker Chemical has a 52 week low of $138.67 and a 52 week high of $221.94. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $199.04 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $186.77. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.48, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.48 and a beta of 1.49.

Quaker Chemical (NYSE:KWR) last released its earnings results on Friday, March 1st. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.67 by $0.11. Quaker Chemical had a net margin of 5.77% and a return on equity of 10.22%. The firm had revenue of $467.11 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $470.55 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.39 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 3.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Quaker Chemical will post 8.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Quaker Chemical Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 30th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, April 16th will be paid a dividend of $0.455 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, April 15th. This represents a $1.82 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.95%. Quaker Chemical’s payout ratio is 29.07%.

Quaker Chemical announced that its board has authorized a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, February 28th that allows the company to buyback $150.00 million in shares. This buyback authorization allows the specialty chemicals company to reacquire up to 4.2% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are typically an indication that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Quaker Chemical Company Profile

Quaker Chemical Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, develops, produces, and markets various formulated specialty chemical products for a range of heavy industrial and manufacturing applications in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific. It offers metal removal fluids, cleaning fluids, corrosion inhibitors, metal drawing and forming fluids, die-cast mold releases, heat treatment and quenchants, metal forging fluids, hydraulic fluids, specialty greases, offshore sub-sea energy control fluids, rolling lubricants, rod and wire drawing fluids, and surface treatment chemicals.