Ashland Inc. (NYSE:ASH) Receives $62.78 Consensus Target Price from Analysts

Ashland Inc. (NYSE:ASH) has been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the eleven analysts that are currently covering the company, Marketbeat reports. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, three have given a hold recommendation and six have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average twelve-month target price among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $62.7778.

Several brokerages have commented on ASH. Zacks Research cut shares of Ashland from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 5th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price objective on shares of Ashland from $70.00 to $65.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Argus reduced their price objective on shares of Ashland from $70.00 to $56.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, March 23rd. Morgan Stanley set a $58.00 price target on shares of Ashland in a research note on Monday, May 4th. Finally, Evercore set a $62.00 price objective on shares of Ashland in a research note on Wednesday, February 18th.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Ashland

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Ashland by 284.3% during the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 3,454,646 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $172,318,000 after purchasing an additional 2,555,585 shares during the last quarter. Standard Investments LLC purchased a new position in shares of Ashland during the third quarter worth $107,318,000. Franklin Resources Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Ashland by 13,240.8% during the fourth quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 1,736,173 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $101,861,000 after purchasing an additional 1,723,159 shares during the last quarter. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Ashland by 775.6% during the fourth quarter. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,900,000 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $111,473,000 after purchasing an additional 1,682,994 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. raised its holdings in shares of Ashland by 1,080,682.0% during the fourth quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 1,437,440 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $84,335,000 after purchasing an additional 1,437,307 shares during the last quarter. 93.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Ashland Trading Up 5.0%

Shares of Ashland stock opened at $56.78 on Wednesday. The company has a market capitalization of $2.60 billion, a P/E ratio of -3.68, a P/E/G ratio of 1.74 and a beta of 0.40. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74, a quick ratio of 1.78 and a current ratio of 3.06. The company has a fifty day moving average of $54.67 and a 200 day moving average of $56.78. Ashland has a fifty-two week low of $46.29 and a fifty-two week high of $65.64.

Ashland (NYSE:ASH) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, April 28th. The basic materials company reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.97 by ($0.06). The firm had revenue of $964.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $485.61 million. Ashland had a positive return on equity of 8.06% and a negative net margin of 39.03%.The company’s quarterly revenue was up .6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.99 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Ashland will post 3.51 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ashland Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 1st will be paid a $0.42 dividend. This represents a $1.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.0%. This is a positive change from Ashland’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.42. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 1st. Ashland’s payout ratio is -10.77%.

Ashland Company Profile

Ashland Inc is a global specialty chemicals company that develops, manufactures and supplies a broad range of performance and process-critical additives, ingredients and technologies. Its portfolio spans performance additives for coatings, adhesives and sealants; specialty ingredients for personal care and pharmaceutical applications; and process aids used in water treatment and other industrial processes. Ashland aims to address customer challenges by delivering tailored solutions that improve product performance, processing efficiency and sustainability outcomes.

Founded in 1924 as the Ashland Oil & Refining Company, the firm gradually expanded into the specialty chemicals sector over the second half of the 20th century.