Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) Short Interest Update

Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) was the recipient of a significant decline in short interest in the month of January. As of January 31st, there was short interest totalling 6,170,000 shares, a decline of 6.5% from the January 15th total of 6,600,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 2,660,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 2.3 days. Currently, 5.7% of the shares of the company are sold short.

Institutional Trading of Celanese

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. DT Investment Partners LLC grew its position in Celanese by 128.8% in the third quarter. DT Investment Partners LLC now owns 183 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $25,000 after buying an additional 103 shares during the last quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. grew its holdings in shares of Celanese by 5.2% in the 3rd quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 2,265 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $308,000 after acquiring an additional 111 shares during the last quarter. Ashton Thomas Private Wealth LLC raised its position in shares of Celanese by 0.7% during the third quarter. Ashton Thomas Private Wealth LLC now owns 21,730 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,954,000 after purchasing an additional 145 shares during the period. Neumann Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Celanese by 5.3% during the third quarter. Neumann Capital Management LLC now owns 3,000 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $408,000 after purchasing an additional 150 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Focus Partners Wealth boosted its position in shares of Celanese by 3.9% in the 4th quarter. Focus Partners Wealth now owns 4,197 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $291,000 after purchasing an additional 156 shares during the period. 98.87% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Citigroup reduced their price target on shares of Celanese from $100.00 to $73.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. BMO Capital Markets downgraded Celanese from a “market perform” rating to an “underperform” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $138.00 to $76.00 in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Morgan Stanley dropped their price target on Celanese from $100.00 to $80.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Piper Sandler reduced their price objective on Celanese from $98.00 to $77.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. Finally, Vertical Research lowered Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $130.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $102.06.

Celanese Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:CE opened at $69.86 on Wednesday. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $69.16 and its 200 day moving average price is $98.72. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 0.76. The stock has a market cap of $7.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.03, a PEG ratio of 1.37 and a beta of 1.17. Celanese has a 12 month low of $64.05 and a 12 month high of $172.16.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 18th. The basic materials company reported $1.45 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.25 by $0.20. Celanese had a return on equity of 13.17% and a net margin of 10.40%. Equities research analysts anticipate that Celanese will post 8.11 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 31st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 25th will be paid a $0.03 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, February 25th. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.17%. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio is currently 1.21%.

Celanese Company Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.