Alejandro Sanchez Sells 300 Shares of Popular (NASDAQ:BPOP) Stock

Popular, Inc. (NASDAQ:BPOP) Director Alejandro Sanchez sold 300 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $150.36, for a total value of $45,108.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 3,960 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $595,425.60. This represents a 7.04% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link.

Popular Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:BPOP opened at $150.63 on Thursday. Popular, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $102.00 and a fifty-two week high of $152.97. The business has a 50-day moving average of $143.19 and a two-hundred day moving average of $133.20. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.72 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.12, a P/E/G ratio of 0.76 and a beta of 0.63.

Popular (NASDAQ:BPOP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 23rd. The bank reported $3.78 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.30 by $0.48. Popular had a return on equity of 14.53% and a net margin of 20.10%.The company had revenue of $816.08 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $866.54 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $2.56 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Popular, Inc. will post 15.14 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Popular Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 29th will be given a $0.75 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 29th. This represents a $3.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.0%. Popular’s payout ratio is currently 22.16%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Popular

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in Popular by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 8,489,936 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $1,057,167,000 after acquiring an additional 37,424 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in Popular by 1.4% during the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 4,361,681 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $543,117,000 after acquiring an additional 58,452 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Popular by 56.2% during the third quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 2,962,871 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $376,314,000 after acquiring an additional 1,065,452 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Popular by 4.8% during the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,405,575 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $175,057,000 after acquiring an additional 64,778 shares during the period. Finally, LSV Asset Management increased its stake in Popular by 9.3% during the fourth quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 1,043,733 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $129,966,000 after acquiring an additional 88,765 shares during the period. 87.27% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

BPOP has been the subject of several research analyst reports. UBS Group boosted their price objective on Popular from $160.00 to $170.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, April 24th. Citigroup boosted their price objective on Popular from $170.00 to $178.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 28th. Barclays boosted their price objective on Popular from $175.00 to $180.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 7th. Credit Suisse Group set a $156.00 price objective on Popular in a research report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Finally, Weiss Ratings raised Popular from a “buy (b+)” rating to a “buy (a-)” rating in a research report on Monday, May 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have assigned a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $168.73.

About Popular

Popular, Inc, headquartered in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is a financial holding company and a leading provider of banking services in the United States mainland and Puerto Rico. Through its primary subsidiaries—Banco Popular de Puerto Rico and Popular Bank—the company delivers comprehensive commercial and consumer banking solutions. It offers deposit products, lending facilities, cash management services and payment-processing solutions designed for individuals, small businesses and large corporations.

The company’s product suite encompasses checking and savings accounts, certificates of deposit, residential and commercial mortgage loans, business lines of credit and credit cards.