Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ:WBA) PT Lowered to $20.00

Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ:WBA) had its price objective decreased by JPMorgan Chase & Co. from $30.00 to $20.00 in a research note issued to investors on Monday, Benzinga reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. currently has an overweight rating on the pharmacy operator’s stock.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently commented on the company. Raymond James reissued a market perform rating on shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance in a research note on Tuesday, March 26th. SVB Leerink reduced their price objective on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $23.00 to $22.00 and set a market perform rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 18th. UBS Group reduced their price objective on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $22.00 to $17.00 and set a neutral rating for the company in a research note on Monday, June 24th. Barclays cut their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $21.00 to $19.00 and set an underweight rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, June 24th. Finally, Bank of America reaffirmed an underperform rating and set a $11.00 target price (down previously from $22.00) on shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance in a research report on Friday, June 28th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have assigned a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus price target of $17.71.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Trading Down 4.1 %

NASDAQ WBA opened at $11.10 on Monday. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $16.10 and a 200 day simple moving average of $19.89. Walgreens Boots Alliance has a one year low of $11.10 and a one year high of $31.32. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.58 billion, a P/E ratio of -1.65, a P/E/G ratio of 0.81 and a beta of 0.72. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a current ratio of 0.65 and a quick ratio of 0.31.

Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ:WBA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, June 27th. The pharmacy operator reported $0.63 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.68 by ($0.05). Walgreens Boots Alliance had a negative net margin of 3.99% and a positive return on equity of 12.63%. The firm had revenue of $36.40 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $35.94 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.00 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts expect that Walgreens Boots Alliance will post 2.87 earnings per share for the current year.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 12th. Investors of record on Tuesday, May 21st were issued a dividend of $0.25 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, May 20th. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 9.01%. Walgreens Boots Alliance’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently -14.84%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Inderpal S. Bhandari bought 3,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, April 11th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $18.05 per share, for a total transaction of $54,150.00. Following the completion of the purchase, the director now directly owns 3,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $54,150. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 17.40% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Walgreens Boots Alliance

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in WBA. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 14.5% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 86,675,198 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $1,927,656,000 after purchasing an additional 10,962,030 shares in the last quarter. Capital World Investors grew its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 57.5% in the first quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 29,061,021 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $630,334,000 after purchasing an additional 10,612,373 shares in the last quarter. Morgan Stanley grew its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 15.8% in the third quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 12,584,371 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $279,876,000 after purchasing an additional 1,720,228 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 10.4% in the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 6,519,845 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $170,233,000 after purchasing an additional 613,847 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. grew its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 12.4% in the fourth quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. now owns 3,077,336 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $80,349,000 after purchasing an additional 339,143 shares in the last quarter. 58.59% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Company Profile

Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc operates as a healthcare, pharmacy, and retail company in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and internationally. It operates through three segments: U.S. Retail Pharmacy, International, and U.S. Healthcare. The U.S. Retail Pharmacy segment engages in operation of the retail drugstores, health and wellness services, specialty, and home delivery pharmacy services, which offers health and wellness, beauty, personal care and consumables, and general merchandise.