Assured Guaranty Ltd. (NYSE:AGO) Sees Significant Decline in Short Interest

Assured Guaranty Ltd. (NYSE:AGO) was the recipient of a significant decline in short interest in July. As of July 31st, there was short interest totalling 769,600 shares, a decline of 11.1% from the July 15th total of 866,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 411,900 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 1.9 days. Approximately 1.5% of the shares of the stock are short sold.

Insider Buying and Selling at Assured Guaranty

In other news, CEO Dominic Frederico sold 40,000 shares of Assured Guaranty stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, June 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $78.12, for a total value of $3,124,800.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 1,410,824 shares in the company, valued at $110,213,570.88. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 5.10% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Assured Guaranty

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of AGO. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its holdings in shares of Assured Guaranty by 14.5% in the second quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,164 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $90,000 after acquiring an additional 147 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning lifted its stake in Assured Guaranty by 1.4% in the second quarter. Creative Planning now owns 11,005 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $849,000 after buying an additional 153 shares in the last quarter. Sage Rhino Capital LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Assured Guaranty by 5.7% in the second quarter. Sage Rhino Capital LLC now owns 2,917 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $225,000 after buying an additional 157 shares during the period. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC increased its position in shares of Assured Guaranty by 2.7% during the second quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC now owns 6,042 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $466,000 after acquiring an additional 161 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its holdings in shares of Assured Guaranty by 1.0% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 31,310 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $2,732,000 after acquiring an additional 302 shares during the period. 92.22% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have weighed in on AGO. UBS Group dropped their target price on shares of Assured Guaranty from $102.00 to $84.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, August 9th. Roth Mkm restated a “buy” rating and issued a $110.00 price objective on shares of Assured Guaranty in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upgraded Assured Guaranty from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $87.00 to $92.00 in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded Assured Guaranty from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, August 12th.

Assured Guaranty Trading Up 1.4 %

Shares of AGO traded up $1.06 on Friday, reaching $76.76. 234,387 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 396,356. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $78.11 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $81.02. Assured Guaranty has a 12 month low of $56.77 and a 12 month high of $96.60. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.18 billion, a P/E ratio of 5.93 and a beta of 1.11. The company has a current ratio of 0.97, a quick ratio of 0.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.30.

Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, August 7th. The financial services provider reported $1.44 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.39 by $0.05. Assured Guaranty had a net margin of 57.45% and a return on equity of 12.48%. The company had revenue of $202.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $193.05 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.60 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 43.9% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts anticipate that Assured Guaranty will post 6.45 earnings per share for the current year.

Assured Guaranty Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 4th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, August 21st will be given a dividend of $0.31 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, August 21st. This represents a $1.24 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.62%. Assured Guaranty’s payout ratio is currently 9.58%.

About Assured Guaranty

Assured Guaranty Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides credit protection products to public finance, infrastructure, and structured finance markets in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments: Insurance and Asset Management. The company offers financial guaranty insurance that protects holders of debt instruments and other monetary obligations from defaults in scheduled payments.