Board of the Pension Protection Fund Acquires Shares of 10,300 MetLife, Inc. $MET

Board of the Pension Protection Fund acquired a new stake in MetLife, Inc. (NYSE:MET) in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm acquired 10,300 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $828,000.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Kathmere Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of MetLife by 88.2% in the 2nd quarter. Kathmere Capital Management LLC now owns 6,328 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $509,000 after buying an additional 2,965 shares during the period. First Horizon Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of MetLife by 4.8% in the 1st quarter. First Horizon Advisors Inc. now owns 422,684 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $33,937,000 after buying an additional 19,192 shares during the period. Ritholtz Wealth Management increased its position in MetLife by 52.1% in the first quarter. Ritholtz Wealth Management now owns 9,355 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $751,000 after purchasing an additional 3,204 shares during the period. Pinnacle Financial Partners Inc acquired a new stake in MetLife in the first quarter worth about $255,000. Finally, Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. increased its position in MetLife by 20.7% in the first quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 60,785 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $4,735,000 after purchasing an additional 10,414 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 94.99% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages have recently commented on MET. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price target on shares of MetLife from $94.00 to $92.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, August 11th. UBS Group lowered their target price on shares of MetLife from $94.00 to $91.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, August 7th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on shares of MetLife from $86.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 8th. Cowen reaffirmed a “buy” rating on shares of MetLife in a report on Friday, August 22nd. Finally, Wolfe Research raised MetLife to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 16th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have assigned a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, MetLife currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $95.18.

MetLife Trading Down 2.6%

NYSE:MET opened at $79.88 on Friday. MetLife, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $65.21 and a fifty-two week high of $89.05. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.57, a current ratio of 0.16 and a quick ratio of 0.16. The stock has a market capitalization of $53.12 billion, a PE ratio of 13.54, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.72 and a beta of 0.86. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $79.68 and its 200-day simple moving average is $78.12.

MetLife (NYSE:MET) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The financial services provider reported $2.02 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.32 by ($0.30). MetLife had a net margin of 5.83% and a return on equity of 19.88%. The company had revenue of $17.34 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $18.58 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.28 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was down 2.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts expect that MetLife, Inc. will post 9.65 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MetLife Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, December 9th. Investors of record on Tuesday, November 4th will be given a $0.5675 dividend. This represents a $2.27 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, November 4th. MetLife’s payout ratio is currently 38.47%.

MetLife Profile

MetLife, Inc, a financial services company, provides insurance, annuities, employee benefits, and asset management services worldwide. It operates through six segments: Retirement and Income Solutions; Group Benefits; Asia; Latin America; Europe, the Middle East and Africa; and MetLife Holdings. The company offers life, dental, group short-and long-term disability, individual disability, pet insurance, accidental death and dismemberment, vision, and accident and health coverages, as well as prepaid legal plans; administrative services-only arrangements to employers; and general and separate account, and synthetic guaranteed interest contracts, as well as private floating rate funding agreements.