Weiss Asset Management LP Purchases New Stake in Cathay General Bancorp $CATY

Weiss Asset Management LP acquired a new position in shares of Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 43,628 shares of the bank’s stock, valued at approximately $2,175,000. Weiss Asset Management LP owned about 0.07% of Cathay General Bancorp at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Danske Bank A S acquired a new stake in shares of Cathay General Bancorp during the third quarter worth $48,000. Hantz Financial Services Inc. lifted its position in shares of Cathay General Bancorp by 55.8% in the 4th quarter. Hantz Financial Services Inc. now owns 1,525 shares of the bank’s stock worth $74,000 after buying an additional 546 shares during the last quarter. Torren Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of Cathay General Bancorp in the 4th quarter valued at about $76,000. NewEdge Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Cathay General Bancorp by 319.7% in the 2nd quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 1,704 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $78,000 after buying an additional 1,298 shares during the period. Finally, Exchange Traded Concepts LLC bought a new stake in shares of Cathay General Bancorp during the 4th quarter valued at about $80,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.01% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. DA Davidson increased their price objective on shares of Cathay General Bancorp from $56.00 to $66.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their target price on Cathay General Bancorp from $64.00 to $67.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Thursday. Piper Sandler upped their target price on Cathay General Bancorp from $45.00 to $47.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a report on Monday, April 27th. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Cathay General Bancorp in a research report on Monday, July 6th. Finally, Zacks Research raised Cathay General Bancorp from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, June 23rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has given a Buy rating, three have issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $60.75.

Cathay General Bancorp Price Performance

Cathay General Bancorp stock opened at $62.92 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 1.03 and a current ratio of 1.04. Cathay General Bancorp has a one year low of $43.65 and a one year high of $63.91. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $60.05 and a 200-day simple moving average of $54.76. The firm has a market capitalization of $4.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.29 and a beta of 0.86.

Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 22nd. The bank reported $1.37 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.35 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $221.20 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $218.28 million. Cathay General Bancorp had a net margin of 24.66% and a return on equity of 11.71%. Cathay General Bancorp’s quarterly revenue was up 13.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.10 EPS. As a group, equities analysts expect that Cathay General Bancorp will post 5.43 earnings per share for the current year.

Cathay General Bancorp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, June 9th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 28th were issued a dividend of $0.38 per share. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, May 28th. Cathay General Bancorp’s payout ratio is 29.69%.

Cathay General Bancorp declared that its board has initiated a stock buyback program on Thursday, April 23rd that allows the company to repurchase $150,000.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the bank to buy up to 4,164,630.6% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically an indication that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, SVP May K. Chan sold 558 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, April 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $56.00, for a total transaction of $31,248.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 2,693 shares in the company, valued at approximately $150,808. The trade was a 17.16% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Vice Chairman Peter Wu sold 20,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.33, for a total value of $1,146,600.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 275,252 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $15,780,197.16. This represents a 6.77% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders own 4.53% of the company’s stock.

Cathay General Bancorp Company Profile

Cathay General Bancorp is a bank holding company headquartered in Los Angeles, California, trading on NASDAQ under the symbol CATY. Its principal subsidiary, Cathay Bank, provides a full suite of financial services to commercial, institutional and retail clients. As a community-focused institution, the company emphasizes relationship banking and tailored solutions for businesses and individuals.

Founded in 1962 by a group of Chinese American entrepreneurs, Cathay has expanded from a single branch operation in downtown Los Angeles into one of the largest Asian-American banks in the United States.