Empowered Funds LLC Grows Stock Holdings in Blackstone Inc. $BX

Empowered Funds LLC grew its holdings in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 21.6% in the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 41,387 shares of the asset manager’s stock after acquiring an additional 7,365 shares during the period. Empowered Funds LLC’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $5,785,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. 1248 Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Blackstone during the first quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Wealth Preservation Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Blackstone during the first quarter valued at approximately $28,000. Bernard Wealth Management Corp. purchased a new position in shares of Blackstone during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $34,000. Putney Financial Group LLC purchased a new position in shares of Blackstone during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $34,000. Finally, von Borstel & Associates Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone during the first quarter valued at approximately $28,000. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Evercore ISI raised their price target on shares of Blackstone from $165.00 to $197.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. JMP Securities raised their price target on shares of Blackstone from $180.00 to $195.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Dbs Bank raised shares of Blackstone to a “moderate buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 12th. The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a “neutral” rating on shares of Blackstone in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their target price on shares of Blackstone from $168.00 to $180.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $172.38.

Insider Activity at Blackstone

In related news, insider John G. Finley sold 21,500 shares of Blackstone stock in a transaction on Monday, September 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $171.46, for a total transaction of $3,686,390.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 453,836 shares in the company, valued at approximately $77,814,720.56. The trade was a 4.52% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, major shareholder Holdings I. L.P. Blackstone bought 1,189,532 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 18th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $25.22 per share, for a total transaction of $29,999,997.04. Following the purchase, the insider owned 4,178,771 shares in the company, valued at $105,388,604.62. This represents a 39.79% increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have bought 1,189,806 shares of company stock worth $30,046,627 and have sold 16,871,634 shares worth $135,328,376. Corporate insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Blackstone Trading Up 3.2%

Shares of Blackstone stock opened at $183.91 on Friday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $169.51 and its 200-day simple moving average is $150.43. The stock has a market capitalization of $135.56 billion, a PE ratio of 49.44, a P/E/G ratio of 1.45 and a beta of 1.77. Blackstone Inc. has a 1-year low of $115.66 and a 1-year high of $200.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 0.74 and a quick ratio of 0.74.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The asset manager reported $1.21 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.10 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $3.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.77 billion. Blackstone had a net margin of 20.83% and a return on equity of 20.47%. The company’s revenue was up 32.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.98 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Blackstone Inc. will post 5.87 earnings per share for the current year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 11th. Investors of record on Monday, August 4th were paid a dividend of $1.03 per share. This is a positive change from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.93. The ex-dividend date was Monday, August 4th. This represents a $4.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.2%. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is presently 110.75%.

About Blackstone

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.