Jackson Square Partners LLC Reduces Position in Warner Music Group Corp. $WMG

Jackson Square Partners LLC reduced its holdings in Warner Music Group Corp. (NASDAQ:WMG) by 83.3% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 87,957 shares of the company’s stock after selling 440,119 shares during the period. Jackson Square Partners LLC’s holdings in Warner Music Group were worth $2,396,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of WMG. New York State Teachers Retirement System raised its holdings in Warner Music Group by 7.2% in the 1st quarter. New York State Teachers Retirement System now owns 22,243 shares of the company’s stock valued at $697,000 after acquiring an additional 1,500 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Warner Music Group by 2.9% in the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 326,449 shares of the company’s stock valued at $10,234,000 after purchasing an additional 9,103 shares in the last quarter. Brown Advisory Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Warner Music Group by 28.7% in the first quarter. Brown Advisory Inc. now owns 22,820 shares of the company’s stock valued at $715,000 after purchasing an additional 5,090 shares during the last quarter. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale lifted its position in Warner Music Group by 25.6% during the first quarter. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale now owns 68,712 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,153,000 after buying an additional 14,000 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Alps Advisors Inc. lifted its position in Warner Music Group by 14.9% during the first quarter. Alps Advisors Inc. now owns 174,773 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,479,000 after buying an additional 22,694 shares in the last quarter. 96.88% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have issued reports on WMG shares. Tigress Financial upped their target price on Warner Music Group from $44.00 to $45.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 10th. Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of Warner Music Group from $33.00 to $41.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 9th. UBS Group set a $45.00 target price on shares of Warner Music Group in a research note on Wednesday, September 10th. Rothschild & Co Redburn upgraded shares of Warner Music Group from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $30.00 target price on the stock in a report on Tuesday, July 15th. Finally, Weiss Ratings restated a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Warner Music Group in a report on Thursday, October 30th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have assigned a Buy rating, ten have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $35.76.

Warner Music Group Price Performance

WMG stock opened at $30.23 on Friday. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $32.81 and its 200 day moving average price is $30.41. Warner Music Group Corp. has a 12-month low of $25.56 and a 12-month high of $36.64. The company has a current ratio of 0.66, a quick ratio of 0.64 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.37. The company has a market capitalization of $15.76 billion, a PE ratio of 53.04, a P/E/G ratio of 0.95 and a beta of 1.30.

Warner Music Group (NASDAQ:WMG) last released its earnings results on Thursday, August 7th. The company reported ($0.03) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.27 by ($0.30). The firm had revenue of $1.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.59 billion. Warner Music Group had a net margin of 4.59% and a return on equity of 39.95%. The business’s revenue was up 8.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.27 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Warner Music Group Corp. will post 1.39 EPS for the current year.

Warner Music Group Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, December 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, November 19th will be issued a $0.19 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, November 19th. This represents a $0.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.5%. Warner Music Group’s payout ratio is 133.33%.

Warner Music Group Company Profile

Warner Music Group Corp. operates as a music entertainment company in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and internationally. It operates through Recorded Music and Music Publishing segments. The Recorded Music segment is involved in the discovery and development of recording artists, as well as related marketing, promotion, distribution, sale, and licensing of music created by such recording artists; markets its music catalog through compilations and reissuances of previously released music and video titles, as well as previously unreleased materials; and conducts its operation primarily through a collection of record labels, such as Warner Records and Atlantic Records, as well as Asylum, Big Beat, Canvasback, East West, Erato, FFRR, Fueled by Ramen, Nonesuch, Parlophone, Reprise, Roadrunner, Sire, Spinnin’ Records, Warner Classics, and Warner Music Nashville.