Teacher Retirement System of Texas Sells 9,386 Shares of Ecolab Inc. $ECL

Teacher Retirement System of Texas reduced its stake in shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) by 6.3% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 139,746 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 9,386 shares during the period. Teacher Retirement System of Texas’ holdings in Ecolab were worth $37,653,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of ECL. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 1.1% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 24,411,233 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $6,188,736,000 after purchasing an additional 261,489 shares during the period. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 2.3% in the first quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA now owns 4,089,226 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,036,485,000 after purchasing an additional 93,409 shares during the period. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 4.0% in the first quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 3,805,952 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $964,885,000 after purchasing an additional 145,902 shares during the period. Royal Bank of Canada increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 0.8% in the first quarter. Royal Bank of Canada now owns 3,577,229 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $906,900,000 after purchasing an additional 27,619 shares during the period. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 6.8% in the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 2,718,340 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $689,154,000 after purchasing an additional 173,298 shares during the period. 74.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on the company. Robert W. Baird lifted their price objective on Ecolab from $300.00 to $306.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, September 5th. Erste Group Bank assumed coverage on Ecolab in a research note on Tuesday, October 14th. They issued a “buy” rating on the stock. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Ecolab in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Baird R W upgraded Ecolab from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 30th. Finally, Citigroup restated a “buy” rating on shares of Ecolab in a research note on Monday, October 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twelve have given a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $291.69.

Ecolab Trading Up 1.0%

ECL stock opened at $280.02 on Tuesday. Ecolab Inc. has a 1-year low of $221.62 and a 1-year high of $286.04. The company has a current ratio of 1.44, a quick ratio of 1.12 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.80. The business’s 50 day moving average is $274.36 and its 200-day moving average is $265.74. The firm has a market cap of $79.42 billion, a P/E ratio of 37.39, a P/E/G ratio of 2.85 and a beta of 1.09.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, July 29th. The basic materials company reported $1.89 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.90 by ($0.01). Ecolab had a return on equity of 22.52% and a net margin of 13.59%.The company had revenue of $4.03 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.03 billion. Equities analysts anticipate that Ecolab Inc. will post 7.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ecolab Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, October 15th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, September 16th were paid a dividend of $0.65 per share. This represents a $2.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.9%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, September 16th. Ecolab’s dividend payout ratio is currently 34.71%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Ecolab news, SVP Jennifer J. Bradway sold 807 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $279.28, for a total transaction of $225,378.96. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 4,326 shares in the company, valued at $1,208,165.28. This represents a 15.72% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director David Maclennan acquired 600 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 13th. The shares were bought at an average price of $278.51 per share, with a total value of $167,106.00. Following the completion of the purchase, the director directly owned 20,253 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,640,663.03. This represents a 3.05% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Corporate insiders own 0.50% of the company’s stock.

About Ecolab

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.