Tradition Wealth Management LLC Purchases 78 Shares of Blackstone Inc. $BX

Tradition Wealth Management LLC boosted its position in Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 0.9% during the first quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 9,044 shares of the asset manager’s stock after acquiring an additional 78 shares during the period. Tradition Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $1,264,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund increased its position in shares of Blackstone by 105.4% during the first quarter. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund now owns 13,405 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $1,874,000 after buying an additional 6,878 shares during the period. Lord Abbett & CO. LLC bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone during the fourth quarter valued at about $63,109,000. Parallel Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of Blackstone by 6.6% during the first quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 31,212 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $4,363,000 after buying an additional 1,943 shares during the period. Comprehensive Money Management Services LLC bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone during the fourth quarter valued at about $1,747,000. Finally, Narwhal Capital Management increased its position in shares of Blackstone by 34.3% during the first quarter. Narwhal Capital Management now owns 64,614 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $9,032,000 after buying an additional 16,486 shares during the period. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Blackstone

In other news, major shareholder Holdings I. L.P. Blackstone bought 1,189,532 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated 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 completion of the acquisition, the insider owned 4,178,771 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $105,388,604.62. This trade represents a 39.79% increase in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Vikrant Sawhney sold 50,850 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $173.64, for a total value of $8,829,594.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 737,248 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $128,015,742.72. The trade was a 6.45% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have purchased 1,189,806 shares of company stock valued at $30,046,627 and have sold 16,850,134 shares valued at $131,641,986. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have recently weighed in on BX. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on Blackstone from $153.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, July 11th. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $168.00 to $181.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Evercore ISI upped their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $165.00 to $197.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upped their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $170.00 to $192.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Finally, JMP Securities upped their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $180.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Nine equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $170.12.

Blackstone Stock Down 1.8%

Shares of NYSE BX opened at $164.3350 on Thursday. Blackstone Inc. has a one year low of $115.66 and a one 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. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $160.57 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $149.84. The stock has a market capitalization of $121.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 44.18, a PEG ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 1.71.

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

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 11th. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 4th were issued a $1.03 dividend. This is a positive change from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.93. This represents a $4.12 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.5%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, August 4th. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 110.75%.

Blackstone Profile

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.