Evercore ISI Lowers Warner Music Group (NASDAQ:WMG) Price Target to $35.00

Warner Music Group (NASDAQ:WMG) had its price objective dropped by equities research analysts at Evercore ISI from $36.00 to $35.00 in a research report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has an “outperform” rating on the stock. Evercore ISI’s price target suggests a potential upside of 19.45% from the stock’s previous close.

A number of other analysts also recently commented on WMG. Tigress Financial decreased their target price on Warner Music Group from $52.00 to $44.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. Loop Capital cut their price target on Warner Music Group from $38.00 to $35.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Monday, November 25th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their target price on shares of Warner Music Group from $41.00 to $40.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, November 22nd. Guggenheim decreased their price target on Warner Music Group from $44.00 to $40.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, Citigroup boosted their target price on shares of Warner Music Group from $31.00 to $34.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 29th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Warner Music Group currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $35.33.

Warner Music Group Stock Down 5.6 %

Warner Music Group stock traded down $1.73 during midday trading on Thursday, reaching $29.30. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 4,401,054 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,084,631. Warner Music Group has a fifty-two week low of $27.06 and a fifty-two week high of $38.05. The company has a market cap of $15.18 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.30, a P/E/G ratio of 0.70 and a beta of 1.35. The company has a quick ratio of 0.65, a current ratio of 0.68 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.95. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $31.98 and a 200-day simple moving average of $30.79.

Warner Music Group (NASDAQ:WMG) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The company reported $0.08 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.28 by ($0.20). Warner Music Group had a return on equity of 69.29% and a net margin of 6.77%. The business had revenue of $1.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.59 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.34 EPS. Warner Music Group’s quarterly revenue was up 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts expect that Warner Music Group will post 1.34 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Warner Music Group

In other news, Director Lincoln E. Benet sold 35,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $30.96, for a total transaction of $1,083,600.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 242,360 shares in the company, valued at $7,503,465.60. The trade was a 12.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. 73.35% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 37.1% in the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 8,754,504 shares of the company’s stock valued at $274,016,000 after purchasing an additional 2,370,973 shares during the last quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. lifted its holdings in Warner Music Group by 2,699.4% during the 3rd quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. now owns 8,217,467 shares of the company’s stock worth $257,207,000 after purchasing an additional 7,923,926 shares during the last quarter. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP boosted its stake in Warner Music Group by 47.4% in the 2nd quarter. Darlington Partners Capital Management LP now owns 8,072,372 shares of the company’s stock valued at $247,418,000 after purchasing an additional 2,594,994 shares during the period. D1 Capital Partners L.P. increased its position in Warner Music Group by 91.5% during the 3rd quarter. D1 Capital Partners L.P. now owns 5,264,498 shares of the company’s stock worth $164,779,000 after buying an additional 2,514,715 shares during the period. Finally, Independent Franchise Partners LLP bought a new stake in shares of Warner Music Group in the second quarter valued at about $160,156,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 96.88% of the company’s stock.

About Warner Music Group

Warner Music Group Corp. operates as a music entertainment company in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and internationally. It operates through Recorded Music and Music Publishing segments. The Recorded Music segment is involved in the discovery and development of recording artists, as well as related marketing, promotion, distribution, sale, and licensing of music created by such recording artists; markets its music catalog through compilations and reissuances of previously released music and video titles, as well as previously unreleased materials; and conducts its operation primarily through a collection of record labels, such as Warner Records and Atlantic Records, as well as Asylum, Big Beat, Canvasback, East West, Erato, FFRR, Fueled by Ramen, Nonesuch, Parlophone, Reprise, Roadrunner, Sire, Spinnin’ Records, Warner Classics, and Warner Music Nashville.