Smith Thornton Advisors LLC Purchases 176 Shares of PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP)

Smith Thornton Advisors LLC grew its stake in PepsiCo, Inc. (NASDAQ:PEP) by 9.5% in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 2,030 shares of the company’s stock after acquiring an additional 176 shares during the period. Smith Thornton Advisors LLC’s holdings in PepsiCo were worth $304,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of PEP. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of PepsiCo in the 4th quarter valued at about $2,729,565,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its holdings in shares of PepsiCo by 19,106.5% in the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 4,588,614 shares of the company’s stock valued at $688,017,000 after acquiring an additional 4,564,723 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its holdings in shares of PepsiCo by 106.1% in the 1st quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 3,514,965 shares of the company’s stock valued at $527,034,000 after acquiring an additional 1,809,391 shares in the last quarter. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH bought a new position in shares of PepsiCo in the 4th quarter valued at about $221,297,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in PepsiCo by 1.0% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 133,371,504 shares of the company’s stock valued at $20,280,471,000 after purchasing an additional 1,376,133 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 73.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on PEP shares. Evercore ISI set a $140.00 target price on shares of PepsiCo in a research note on Thursday, April 24th. Citigroup cut their target price on shares of PepsiCo from $170.00 to $160.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on shares of PepsiCo from $168.00 to $153.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 25th. Royal Bank Of Canada reiterated a “sector perform” rating and issued a $148.00 target price on shares of PepsiCo in a research note on Tuesday, June 24th. Finally, Bank of America cut their price objective on shares of PepsiCo from $150.00 to $145.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fifteen have given a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, PepsiCo has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $158.19.

PepsiCo Stock Down 0.6%

NASDAQ PEP opened at $135.26 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.83, a quick ratio of 0.65 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.13. PepsiCo, Inc. has a 1-year low of $127.60 and a 1-year high of $180.91. The company has a 50 day moving average of $131.49 and a 200-day moving average of $141.58. The company has a market cap of $185.45 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.89, a PEG ratio of 4.23 and a beta of 0.45.

PepsiCo (NASDAQ:PEP) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 24th. The company reported $1.48 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.49 by ($0.01). PepsiCo had a net margin of 10.24% and a return on equity of 58.28%. The business had revenue of $17.92 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $17.81 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.61 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts expect that PepsiCo, Inc. will post 8.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

PepsiCo Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 30th. Investors of record on Friday, June 6th were paid a $1.4225 dividend. This represents a $5.69 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.21%. This is a boost from PepsiCo’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.36. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, June 6th. PepsiCo’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 83.68%.

PepsiCo Profile

PepsiCo, Inc engages in the manufacture, marketing, distribution, and sale of various beverages and convenient foods worldwide. The company operates through seven segments: Frito-Lay North America; Quaker Foods North America; PepsiCo Beverages North America; Latin America; Europe; Africa, Middle East and South Asia; and Asia Pacific, Australia and New Zealand and China Region.