Triangle Securities Wealth Management Sells 564 Shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

Triangle Securities Wealth Management cut its stake in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX – Get Rating) by 0.9% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 59,927 shares of the asset manager’s stock after selling 564 shares during the period. Blackstone accounts for about 1.6% of Triangle Securities Wealth Management’s portfolio, making the stock its 13th biggest position. Triangle Securities Wealth Management’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $4,446,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Colony Group LLC boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 0.7% during the 2nd quarter. Colony Group LLC now owns 14,333 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $1,308,000 after acquiring an additional 95 shares during the last quarter. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.1% during the 3rd quarter. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 4,799 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $402,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares during the last quarter. Capital Analysts LLC boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 11.7% during the 2nd quarter. Capital Analysts LLC now owns 966 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $88,000 after acquiring an additional 101 shares during the last quarter. MONECO Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 0.7% during the 3rd quarter. MONECO Advisors LLC now owns 16,696 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $1,397,000 after acquiring an additional 108 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Verus Capital Partners LLC boosted its position in shares of Blackstone by 2.3% during the 3rd quarter. Verus Capital Partners LLC now owns 5,445 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $456,000 after acquiring an additional 120 shares during the last quarter. 62.39% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have recently issued reports on BX shares. StockNews.com started coverage on Blackstone in a research report on Thursday. They set a “sell” rating for the company. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on Blackstone from $95.00 to $103.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 27th. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their target price on Blackstone from $86.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, January 30th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on Blackstone from $110.00 to $115.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, January 30th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on Blackstone from $85.00 to $92.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 27th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $112.33.

Blackstone Trading Down 2.7 %

Shares of BX traded down $2.37 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $84.89. 33,987,863 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 5,357,988. The company has a quick ratio of 0.97, a current ratio of 0.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.69. Blackstone Inc. has a 1 year low of $71.72 and a 1 year high of $132.93. The firm has a market capitalization of $59.96 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.82, a PEG ratio of 1.88 and a beta of 1.52. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $89.93 and its 200-day moving average price is $88.08.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX – Get Rating) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, January 26th. The asset manager reported $1.07 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.95 by $0.12. Blackstone had a return on equity of 19.43% and a net margin of 20.52%. The firm had revenue of $1.70 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.62 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.71 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.66 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, February 13th. Investors of record on Monday, February 6th were paid a $0.91 dividend. This represents a $3.64 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.29%. This is a boost from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.90. The ex-dividend date was Friday, February 3rd. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is presently 153.59%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, major shareholder Bx Buzz Ml-1 Gp Llc sold 11,750,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $22.17, for a total value of $260,497,500.00. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, major shareholder Bx Buzz Ml-1 Gp Llc sold 11,750,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $22.17, for a total value of $260,497,500.00. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director Joseph Baratta sold 85,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $95.94, for a total value of $8,154,900.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 1,122,168 shares in the company, valued at $107,660,797.92. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 140,532,616 shares of company stock valued at $1,726,902,967 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Blackstone Profile

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Blackstone, Inc engages in the provision of investment and fund management services. It operates through the following segments: Real Estate, Private Equity, Credit and Insurance, and Hedge Fund Solutions. The Real Estate segment includes management of opportunistic real estate funds, Core+ real estate funds, high-yield real estate debt funds, and liquid real estate debt funds.