Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC Acquires 1,411,662 Shares of Navient Corporation $NAVI

Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Navient Corporation (NASDAQ:NAVI) by 790.1% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,590,339 shares of the credit services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,411,662 shares during the period. Navient accounts for 0.6% of Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 18th biggest holding. Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC owned about 1.63% of Navient worth $20,913,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Intrust Bank NA raised its position in Navient by 8.4% during the 2nd quarter. Intrust Bank NA now owns 11,503 shares of the credit services provider’s stock worth $162,000 after purchasing an additional 895 shares during the last quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS grew its position in shares of Navient by 5.4% in the 2nd quarter. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS now owns 18,698 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $264,000 after buying an additional 951 shares during the last quarter. CWM LLC grew its position in shares of Navient by 79.0% in the 3rd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 2,525 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $33,000 after buying an additional 1,114 shares during the last quarter. Corient Private Wealth LLC increased its stake in shares of Navient by 6.8% in the second quarter. Corient Private Wealth LLC now owns 18,372 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $259,000 after buying an additional 1,168 shares during the period. Finally, Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund increased its stake in shares of Navient by 4.4% in the third quarter. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund now owns 41,029 shares of the credit services provider’s stock valued at $540,000 after buying an additional 1,727 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 97.14% of the company’s stock.

Navient Trading Up 0.9%

Shares of NAVI stock opened at $8.13 on Monday. Navient Corporation has a fifty-two week low of $7.86 and a fifty-two week high of $16.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 16.94, a quick ratio of 9.01 and a current ratio of 9.01. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $10.30 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $11.84. The company has a market cap of $773.08 million, a P/E ratio of -9.91 and a beta of 1.33.

Navient (NASDAQ:NAVI) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 27th. The credit services provider reported $0.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.31 by ($0.29). The business had revenue of $137.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $144.25 million. Navient had a positive return on equity of 4.70% and a negative net margin of 2.47%.During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted ($0.24) earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that Navient Corporation will post 1.04 earnings per share for the current year.

Navient Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 20th. Investors of record on Friday, March 6th will be paid a dividend of $0.16 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 6th. This represents a $0.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 7.9%. Navient’s dividend payout ratio is currently -78.05%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts recently commented on NAVI shares. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their price objective on Navient from $15.00 to $9.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. Zacks Research lowered shares of Navient from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a report on Monday, February 2nd. Morgan Stanley set a $12.00 price target on shares of Navient in a research report on Wednesday, January 28th. Wall Street Zen raised shares of Navient from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 7th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reiterated a “sell (d)” rating on shares of Navient in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a Hold rating and six have issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Strong Sell” and an average target price of $11.63.

Navient Company Profile

Navient Corporation (NASDAQ: NAVI) is a specialized provider of asset management and business processing solutions, with a primary focus on student loan servicing. Established in 2014 through the separation from Sallie Mae, Navient assumed responsibility for servicing federal and private education loans, positioning itself as one of the largest servicers of higher education debt in the United States.

The company’s core activities center on federal student loan servicing under contracts with the U.S.