Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) Sees Large Volume Increase – Here’s Why

Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) saw unusually-strong trading volume on Tuesday . Approximately 800,383 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 47% from the previous session’s volume of 1,506,411 shares.The stock last traded at $103.60 and had previously closed at $104.23.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the company. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their price target on Veralto from $119.00 to $117.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, December 11th. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their price objective on shares of Veralto from $108.00 to $111.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Jefferies Financial Group started coverage on shares of Veralto in a research note on Thursday, December 12th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $125.00 target price on the stock. Finally, BMO Capital Markets upped their target price on Veralto from $117.00 to $119.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, September 30th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Veralto presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $109.50.

Veralto Stock Down 2.2 %

The firm has a market capitalization of $25.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 31.24, a P/E/G ratio of 4.30 and a beta of 0.91. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $106.48 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $105.38. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.35, a quick ratio of 1.87 and a current ratio of 2.13.

Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, October 23rd. The company reported $0.89 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $1.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.30 billion. Veralto had a net margin of 15.69% and a return on equity of 52.85%. Veralto’s revenue was up 4.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.75 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that Veralto Co. will post 3.48 EPS for the current year.

Veralto Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, October 31st. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 27th were paid a dividend of $0.09 per share. This represents a $0.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.36%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 27th. Veralto’s payout ratio is 11.11%.

Insider Activity

In other Veralto news, CEO Jennifer Honeycutt sold 13,190 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $110.15, for a total value of $1,452,878.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 138,546 shares in the company, valued at $15,260,841.90. This represents a 8.69 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, SVP Surekha Trivedi sold 753 shares of Veralto stock in a transaction on Tuesday, October 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $112.55, for a total value of $84,750.15. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 11,165 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,256,620.75. This trade represents a 6.32 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 14,695 shares of company stock valued at $1,615,017. Insiders own 0.31% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Veralto

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. State Street Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Veralto by 9.8% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 9,599,499 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,074,654,000 after purchasing an additional 860,608 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Veralto by 207.2% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,122,898 shares of the company’s stock valued at $125,608,000 after acquiring an additional 757,389 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Veralto by 10.5% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,868,620 shares of the company’s stock valued at $654,232,000 after acquiring an additional 558,393 shares in the last quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. boosted its stake in Veralto by 29.0% in the 3rd quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. now owns 1,864,038 shares of the company’s stock worth $208,511,000 after purchasing an additional 418,588 shares during the period. Finally, Point72 Asset Management L.P. acquired a new stake in shares of Veralto in the second quarter worth $24,618,000. 91.28% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Veralto

Veralto Corporation provides water analytics, water treatment, marking and coding, and packaging and color services worldwide. It operates through two segments, Water Quality (WQ) and Product Quality & Innovation (PQI). The WQ segment offers precision instrumentation and water treatment technologies to measure, analyze, and treat water in residential, commercial, municipal, industrial, research, and natural resource applications through the Hach, Trojan Technologies, and ChemTreat brands.