Bank of Montreal Can Lowers Stock Holdings in Blackstone Inc. $BX

Bank of Montreal Can trimmed its holdings in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 13.4% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 854,976 shares of the asset manager’s stock after selling 132,596 shares during the period. Bank of Montreal Can owned approximately 0.12% of Blackstone worth $127,887,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC raised its holdings in Blackstone by 519,669.1% in the 2nd quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC now owns 70,132,441 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $10,490,411,000 after acquiring an additional 70,118,948 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in Blackstone by 1.6% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,997,581 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $9,504,702,000 after acquiring an additional 1,102,949 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. raised its holdings in Blackstone by 16.3% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,292,320 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $739,761,000 after acquiring an additional 742,829 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC raised its holdings in Blackstone by 4.4% in the 1st quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 4,291,546 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $599,872,000 after acquiring an additional 182,526 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in Blackstone by 2.9% during the 1st quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,162,867 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $581,886,000 after buying an additional 117,724 shares during the last quarter. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

BX has been the subject of a number of research reports. BMO Capital Markets decreased their target price on shares of Blackstone from $190.00 to $180.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, October 27th. Evercore ISI decreased their target price on shares of Blackstone from $197.00 to $180.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, October 22nd. BNP Paribas Exane decreased their target price on shares of Blackstone from $178.00 to $167.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, October 24th. Dbs Bank upgraded shares of Blackstone to a “moderate buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 12th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on shares of Blackstone from $153.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, July 11th. Eleven analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Blackstone has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $179.74.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider John G. Finley sold 21,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, September 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $171.46, for a total value of $3,686,390.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 453,836 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $77,814,720.56. This represents a 4.52% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, major shareholder Private Multi-Asset Blackstone bought 2,538,071 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, September 22nd. The stock was purchased at an average cost of $25.61 per share, with a total value of $64,999,998.31. Following the acquisition, the insider directly owned 7,506,209 shares in the company, valued at $192,234,012.49. This trade represents a 51.09% increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase is available in the SEC filing. In the last three months, insiders have purchased 2,551,515 shares of company stock worth $67,038,327 and have sold 16,884,634 shares worth $138,445,346. 1.00% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Blackstone Trading Down 1.7%

Shares of BX stock opened at $144.11 on Tuesday. Blackstone Inc. has a 1 year low of $115.66 and a 1 year high of $200.96. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $168.00 and a 200-day moving average price of $157.09. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.60, a current ratio of 0.75 and a quick ratio of 0.74. The company has a market cap of $106.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.17, a PEG ratio of 1.18 and a beta of 1.77.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last issued its earnings results on Friday, November 22nd. The asset manager reported $0.97 earnings per share for the quarter. The company had revenue of $2.49 billion during the quarter. Blackstone had a net margin of 20.56% and a return on equity of 22.30%. As a group, equities analysts predict that Blackstone Inc. will post 5.87 earnings per share for the current year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 10th. Investors of record on Monday, November 3rd will be issued a $1.29 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 3rd. This represents a $5.16 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.6%. This is an increase from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.03. Blackstone’s payout ratio is currently 147.43%.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.