British American Tobacco (LON:BATS) Reaches New 1-Year High – Here’s What Happened

British American Tobacco p.l.c. (LON:BATS) reached a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Wednesday . The company traded as high as GBX 4,809 and last traded at GBX 4,789, with a volume of 68723219 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at GBX 4,634.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “buy” rating and set a GBX 5,200 price objective on shares of British American Tobacco in a report on Thursday, April 16th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of GBX 4,500.

British American Tobacco Price Performance

The company has a market cap of £105.67 billion, a PE ratio of 13.99, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.12 and a beta of 0.12. The company has a quick ratio of 0.47, a current ratio of 0.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 74.60. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of GBX 4,363.80 and a 200-day simple moving average of GBX 4,307.06.

British American Tobacco (LON:BATS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The company reported GBX 176.76 earnings per share for the quarter. British American Tobacco had a net margin of 30.23% and a return on equity of 16.33%. As a group, research analysts predict that British American Tobacco p.l.c. will post 361.5079365 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Tadeu Marroco bought 6,036 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, May 8th. The stock was bought at an average cost of GBX 4,426 per share, for a total transaction of £267,153.36. Insiders have purchased 6,450 shares of company stock valued at $28,491,382 in the last three months. 0.12% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

British American Tobacco Company Profile

BAT was founded in 1902 and was first listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1912. A constituent of the FTSE 100 since its creation in 1984, we have evolved, becoming the only truly global company in our sector.

BAT is transforming and is well positioned with a global footprint and multi-category portfolio. Our corporate purpose is to build A Better Tomorrow™, reducing the health impact of our business, by offering adult consumers a greater choice of enjoyable and less risky*† products compared to cigarettes.