Vest Financial LLC Takes $1.64 Million Position in Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO)

Vest Financial LLC acquired a new stake in Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) in the first quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund acquired 16,824 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,639,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of Veralto by 0.5% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 29,347,185 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,989,011,000 after buying an additional 146,234 shares during the last quarter. Amundi raised its stake in shares of Veralto by 2.3% in the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 7,169,702 shares of the company’s stock valued at $731,084,000 after buying an additional 158,342 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Veralto by 12.5% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 6,601,676 shares of the company’s stock valued at $670,781,000 after buying an additional 733,056 shares during the period. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA raised its stake in shares of Veralto by 1.2% during the 4th quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA now owns 4,764,889 shares of the company’s stock valued at $485,304,000 after purchasing an additional 54,795 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. raised its stake in shares of Veralto by 9.7% during the 4th quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,541,367 shares of the company’s stock valued at $462,538,000 after purchasing an additional 401,228 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.28% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, SVP Lesley Beneteau sold 458 shares of Veralto stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $100.84, for a total transaction of $46,184.72. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 13,571 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,368,499.64. The trade was a 3.26% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, SVP Surekha Trivedi sold 848 shares of Veralto stock in a transaction on Monday, June 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $100.55, for a total value of $85,266.40. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 8,433 shares in the company, valued at $847,938.15. This trade represents a 9.14% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 56,917 shares of company stock valued at $5,423,033. Corporate insiders own 0.36% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts recently issued reports on VLTO shares. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their price objective on Veralto from $102.00 to $104.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 1st. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on Veralto from $103.00 to $104.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Thursday, May 1st. Northcoast Research started coverage on Veralto in a report on Tuesday, May 6th. They set a “buy” rating and a $110.00 target price for the company. Robert W. Baird increased their target price on Veralto from $105.00 to $106.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, May 1st. Finally, Citigroup dropped their price objective on Veralto from $116.00 to $100.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, April 14th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $110.09.

Veralto Stock Up 0.6%

Shares of NYSE:VLTO opened at $100.29 on Friday. Veralto Co. has a 52-week low of $83.87 and a 52-week high of $115.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $24.86 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.03, a P/E/G ratio of 4.24 and a beta of 0.97. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $95.32 and a 200-day moving average price of $99.36. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a quick ratio of 1.69 and a current ratio of 1.92.

Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 29th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.87 by $0.08. Veralto had a return on equity of 49.29% and a net margin of 16.04%. The company had revenue of $1.33 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.28 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.84 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.9% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Veralto Co. will post 3.66 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Veralto Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 31st. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 30th will be issued a $0.11 dividend. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.44%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 30th. Veralto’s payout ratio is 12.57%.

Veralto Company Profile

Veralto Corporation provides water analytics, water treatment, marking and coding, and packaging and color services worldwide. It operates through two segments, Water Quality (WQ) and Product Quality & Innovation (PQI). The WQ segment offers precision instrumentation and water treatment technologies to measure, analyze, and treat water in residential, commercial, municipal, industrial, research, and natural resource applications through the Hach, Trojan Technologies, and ChemTreat brands.