Global Payments (NYSE:GPN) Price Target Lowered to $152.00 at TD Cowen

Global Payments (NYSE:GPN) had its price objective cut by TD Cowen from $160.00 to $152.00 in a report published on Thursday, Benzinga reports. They currently have a buy rating on the business services provider’s stock.

Several other equities analysts have also recently weighed in on the company. Robert W. Baird dropped their price objective on Global Payments from $182.00 to $150.00 and set an outperform rating for the company in a report on Thursday. UBS Group lifted their price objective on Global Payments from $130.00 to $145.00 and gave the company a neutral rating in a report on Thursday, February 15th. B. Riley lifted their price objective on Global Payments from $180.00 to $186.00 and gave the company a buy rating in a report on Monday, February 5th. Susquehanna dropped their price objective on Global Payments from $160.00 to $157.00 and set a positive rating for the company in a report on Thursday. Finally, StockNews.com cut Global Payments from a buy rating to a hold rating in a report on Thursday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and twenty-one have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and an average price target of $150.00.

Global Payments Stock Performance

GPN traded up $0.83 during trading on Thursday, hitting $111.37. The stock had a trading volume of 3,191,218 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,029,470. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $127.93 and a 200-day moving average price of $124.72. The firm has a market cap of $28.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.10, a P/E/G ratio of 0.71 and a beta of 0.97. Global Payments has a one year low of $95.12 and a one year high of $141.77. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a current ratio of 0.92 and a quick ratio of 0.99.

Global Payments (NYSE:GPN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 14th. The business services provider reported $2.65 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.64 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $2.43 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.18 billion. Global Payments had a return on equity of 11.72% and a net margin of 13.40%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 7.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $2.30 EPS. As a group, research analysts predict that Global Payments will post 10.94 EPS for the current year.

Global Payments Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, June 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 14th will be given a dividend of $0.25 per share. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.90%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 14th. Global Payments’s dividend payout ratio is presently 19.84%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Global Payments

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. FMR LLC lifted its stake in shares of Global Payments by 40.7% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 9,346,779 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $1,078,525,000 after purchasing an additional 2,703,434 shares during the period. Boston Partners lifted its stake in shares of Global Payments by 40.5% in the 3rd quarter. Boston Partners now owns 5,142,771 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $591,613,000 after purchasing an additional 1,481,714 shares during the period. Franklin Resources Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Global Payments by 2.7% in the 4th quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 5,087,801 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $646,151,000 after purchasing an additional 132,635 shares during the period. Victory Capital Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Global Payments by 3.4% in the 3rd quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 3,499,860 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $403,849,000 after purchasing an additional 116,664 shares during the period. Finally, Morgan Stanley lifted its stake in shares of Global Payments by 2.7% in the 3rd quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 3,402,869 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $392,657,000 after purchasing an additional 89,057 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 89.76% of the company’s stock.

About Global Payments

Global Payments Inc provides payment technology and software solutions for card, check, and digital-based payments in the Americas, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific. It operates through two segments, Merchant Solutions and Issuer Solutions. The Merchant Solutions segment offers authorization, settlement and funding, customer support, chargeback resolution, terminal rental, sales and deployment, payment security, and consolidated billing and reporting services.