Retirement Systems of Alabama Sells 3,540 Shares of Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX)

Retirement Systems of Alabama lessened its holdings in shares of Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX) by 1.7% in the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 208,331 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 3,540 shares during the quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama owned 0.12% of Cognex worth $8,437,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. SG Americas Securities LLC bought a new stake in shares of Cognex during the second quarter worth about $567,000. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. increased its holdings in Cognex by 13.1% during the 2nd quarter. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. now owns 13,677 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $640,000 after purchasing an additional 1,581 shares in the last quarter. Raymond James & Associates raised its stake in shares of Cognex by 8.3% in the second quarter. Raymond James & Associates now owns 379,100 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $17,727,000 after purchasing an additional 29,118 shares during the last quarter. Raymond James Financial Services Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Cognex by 9.5% in the second quarter. Raymond James Financial Services Advisors Inc. now owns 225,560 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $10,547,000 after purchasing an additional 19,619 shares in the last quarter. Finally, First Citizens Bank & Trust Co. purchased a new position in shares of Cognex during the second quarter valued at approximately $209,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 88.12% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have weighed in on CGNX shares. Truist Financial cut Cognex from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and dropped their price objective for the company from $46.00 to $43.00 in a research note on Tuesday, November 5th. Stephens raised shares of Cognex from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price target for the company from $45.00 to $55.00 in a research report on Wednesday, October 16th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reduced their price objective on shares of Cognex from $50.00 to $47.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, November 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $47.91.

Insider Activity at Cognex

In other news, Director Anthony Sun sold 26,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $40.03, for a total transaction of $1,040,780.00. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 26,608 shares in the company, valued at $1,065,118.24. This represents a 49.42 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CTO Joerg Kuechen sold 2,934 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $37.75, for a total transaction of $110,758.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 1.10% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Cognex Trading Down 2.4 %

Shares of NASDAQ CGNX opened at $36.57 on Wednesday. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $39.76 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $41.94. Cognex Co. has a 1-year low of $34.79 and a 1-year high of $53.13. The firm has a market cap of $6.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 70.33 and a beta of 1.39.

Cognex Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 29th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 14th were issued a $0.08 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, November 14th. This represents a $0.32 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.88%. This is a positive change from Cognex’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.08. Cognex’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 61.54%.

Cognex Company Profile

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process.