Peoples Bancorp Inc. (NASDAQ:PEBO) Receives Average Rating of “Hold” from Analysts

Peoples Bancorp Inc. (NASDAQ:PEBO) has been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the six analysts that are presently covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and two have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price target among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $35.25.

PEBO has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Wall Street Zen lowered Peoples Bancorp from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday, October 3rd. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Peoples Bancorp in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised their price objective on Peoples Bancorp from $32.00 to $33.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 11th. Finally, Zacks Research raised Peoples Bancorp from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, September 22nd.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Peoples Bancorp news, Director Carol A. Schneeberger sold 1,000 shares of Peoples Bancorp stock in a transaction on Wednesday, October 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $30.22, for a total value of $30,220.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 23,767 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $718,238.74. This trade represents a 4.04% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Dwight Eric Smith bought 1,060 shares of Peoples Bancorp stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 24th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $30.27 per share, with a total value of $32,086.20. Following the acquisition, the director owned 6,999 shares in the company, valued at approximately $211,859.73. This represents a 17.85% increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. 3.41% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Peoples Bancorp

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Parallel Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Peoples Bancorp by 132.3% during the second quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 864 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $26,000 after purchasing an additional 492 shares during the period. Strs Ohio bought a new stake in Peoples Bancorp during the first quarter valued at about $62,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its holdings in Peoples Bancorp by 1,426.3% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 2,610 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $77,000 after purchasing an additional 2,439 shares during the period. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Peoples Bancorp by 31.9% during the second quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC now owns 2,931 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $90,000 after purchasing an additional 709 shares during the period. Finally, Tower Research Capital LLC TRC grew its holdings in Peoples Bancorp by 1,191.0% during the second quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 3,718 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $114,000 after purchasing an additional 3,430 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 60.68% of the company’s stock.

Peoples Bancorp Trading Up 1.7%

NASDAQ PEBO opened at $28.15 on Friday. Peoples Bancorp has a fifty-two week low of $26.21 and a fifty-two week high of $37.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 0.82. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $30.08 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $29.71. The stock has a market cap of $1.00 billion, a P/E ratio of 9.64 and a beta of 0.63.

Peoples Bancorp (NASDAQ:PEBO) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 22nd. The bank reported $0.60 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.78 by ($0.18). Peoples Bancorp had a return on equity of 9.46% and a net margin of 16.88%.The business had revenue of $115.02 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $113.20 million. On average, analysts forecast that Peoples Bancorp will post 3.28 earnings per share for the current year.

Peoples Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 18th. Shareholders of record on Monday, August 4th were issued a $0.41 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, August 4th. This represents a $1.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 5.8%. Peoples Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 56.16%.

Peoples Bancorp Company Profile

Peoples Bancorp Inc operates as the holding company for Peoples Bank that provides commercial and consumer banking products and services. The company accepts various deposit products, including demand deposit accounts, savings accounts, money market accounts, certificates of deposit, and governmental deposits; and provides commercial and industrial, commercial real estate, construction, finance, residential real estate, and consumer indirect and direct loans, as well as home equity lines of credit and overdrafts.