Lazard Asset Management LLC Cuts Stock Position in ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. $ASX

Lazard Asset Management LLC cut its stake in shares of ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. (NYSE:ASX) by 32.4% in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 13,530,133 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after selling 6,480,696 shares during the period. Lazard Asset Management LLC owned about 0.61% of ASE Technology worth $293,333,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Rafferty Asset Management LLC increased its stake in shares of ASE Technology by 50.9% during the second quarter. Rafferty Asset Management LLC now owns 7,392,190 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $76,361,000 after purchasing an additional 2,491,918 shares in the last quarter. Millennium Management LLC lifted its stake in ASE Technology by 130.8% in the 3rd quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 3,169,267 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $35,147,000 after buying an additional 1,796,357 shares in the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE boosted its holdings in ASE Technology by 18.8% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 8,815,184 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $91,061,000 after buying an additional 1,397,206 shares during the last quarter. Morgan Stanley boosted its holdings in ASE Technology by 14.3% in the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 10,607,588 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $170,782,000 after buying an additional 1,330,580 shares during the last quarter. Finally, UBS Group AG increased its stake in ASE Technology by 11.4% during the 4th quarter. UBS Group AG now owns 9,038,322 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $145,517,000 after buying an additional 922,692 shares in the last quarter. 6.80% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

ASE Technology Stock Performance

NYSE:ASX opened at $36.79 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $81.80 billion, a P/E ratio of 54.10 and a beta of 1.69. ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. has a twelve month low of $9.30 and a twelve month high of $45.51. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $38.80 and its 200-day moving average price is $29.13. The company has a current ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53.

ASE Technology (NYSE:ASX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The semiconductor company reported $0.20 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.17 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $5.43 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $5.32 billion. ASE Technology had a net margin of 7.03% and a return on equity of 13.48%. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. will post 0.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

ASE Technology Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared an annual dividend, which will be paid on Friday, August 7th. Investors of record on Monday, July 6th will be issued a $0.4171 dividend. This is a boost from ASE Technology’s previous annual dividend of $0.36. This represents a dividend yield of 96.0%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, July 6th. ASE Technology’s payout ratio is 45.59%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have commented on ASX shares. Wall Street Zen raised ASE Technology from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Sunday, April 5th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of ASE Technology in a research note on Tuesday, June 9th. Finally, Zacks Research upgraded ASE Technology from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 5th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has issued a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Buy”.

ASE Technology Company Profile

ASE Technology Holding Co, Ltd. (NYSE: ASX), commonly referred to as ASE, is a Taiwan-based provider of semiconductor assembly and testing services. The company focuses on back-end semiconductor manufacturing and related services that prepare integrated circuits and other semiconductor devices for final use. Its core activities include advanced IC packaging, final testing, wafer probing, and related engineering and supply-chain support for semiconductor customers.

ASE offers a range of products and technical capabilities designed to meet increasingly complex packaging and system-in-package requirements.