PPG Industries (NYSE:PPG) Lowered to In-Line at Evercore ISI

PPG Industries (NYSE:PPG) was downgraded by stock analysts at Evercore ISI from an “outperform” rating to an “in-line” rating in a note issued to investors on Monday, MarketBeat reports. They currently have a $152.00 price objective on the specialty chemicals company’s stock. Evercore ISI’s target price points to a potential upside of 16.56% from the stock’s current price.

A number of other research firms have also recently issued reports on PPG. Vertical Research upgraded PPG Industries from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 3rd. Barclays cut PPG Industries from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and dropped their price objective for the company from $163.00 to $149.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 27th. KeyCorp dropped their price objective on PPG Industries from $167.00 to $164.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, April 9th. Redburn Atlantic cut PPG Industries from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $160.00 price objective for the company. in a report on Thursday, February 1st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company upgraded PPG Industries from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $150.00 to $163.00 in a report on Thursday, April 11th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and ten have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $155.50.

PPG Industries Price Performance

Shares of PPG Industries stock opened at $130.40 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $30.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.03, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.56 and a beta of 1.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.72, a quick ratio of 1.05 and a current ratio of 1.47. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $140.00 and a 200-day moving average price of $138.97. PPG Industries has a one year low of $120.32 and a one year high of $152.89.

PPG Industries (NYSE:PPG) last announced its earnings results on Friday, April 19th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.86 EPS for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.86. The firm had revenue of $4.31 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.43 billion. PPG Industries had a return on equity of 23.13% and a net margin of 7.74%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 1.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.82 EPS. Equities analysts expect that PPG Industries will post 8.46 EPS for the current year.

PPG Industries declared that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Thursday, April 18th that authorizes the company to repurchase $2.50 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the specialty chemicals company to repurchase up to 8.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Transactions at PPG Industries

In other news, CFO Vincent J. Morales sold 3,400 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, March 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $140.94, for a total value of $479,196.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 28,439 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,008,192.66. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 0.56% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in PPG. Norges Bank acquired a new position in PPG Industries during the 4th quarter valued at about $554,685,000. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in PPG Industries by 17.2% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 24,480,664 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $3,661,083,000 after buying an additional 3,600,558 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. increased its position in PPG Industries by 41.1% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,294,142 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $427,580,000 after buying an additional 959,849 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its position in PPG Industries by 4,484.1% during the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 723,690 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $108,228,000 after buying an additional 707,903 shares in the last quarter. Finally, International Assets Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in PPG Industries during the 4th quarter valued at about $74,492,000. 81.86% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About PPG Industries

PPG Industries, Inc manufactures and distributes paints, coatings, and specialty materials in the United States, Canada, the Asia Pacific, Latin America, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. It operates through two segments, Performance Coatings and Industrial Coatings. The Performance Coatings segment offers coatings, solvents, adhesives, sealants, sundries, and software for automotive and commercial transport/fleet repair and refurbishing, light industrial coatings, and specialty coatings for signs; wood stains; paints, thermoplastics, pavement marking products, and other advanced technologies for pavement marking for government, commercial infrastructure, painting, and maintenance contractors; and coatings, sealants, transparencies, transparent armor, adhesives, engineered materials, and packaging and chemical management services for commercial, military, regional jet, and general aviation aircraft.