CENTRAL TRUST Co Grows Holdings in Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT)

CENTRAL TRUST Co raised its position in Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT – Get Rating) by 2.5% in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 14,225 shares of the manufacturing equipment provider’s stock after buying an additional 343 shares during the period. CENTRAL TRUST Co’s holdings in Applied Materials were worth $1,166,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in shares of Applied Materials by 1.7% during the second quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 9,122,174 shares of the manufacturing equipment provider’s stock worth $829,935,000 after purchasing an additional 154,413 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc increased its stake in shares of Applied Materials by 0.9% during the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 7,004,320 shares of the manufacturing equipment provider’s stock worth $637,253,000 after purchasing an additional 63,907 shares in the last quarter. Deutsche Bank AG increased its stake in shares of Applied Materials by 5.0% during the second quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 6,546,624 shares of the manufacturing equipment provider’s stock worth $595,612,000 after purchasing an additional 313,621 shares in the last quarter. Pictet Asset Management SA increased its stake in shares of Applied Materials by 1.2% during the third quarter. Pictet Asset Management SA now owns 6,224,697 shares of the manufacturing equipment provider’s stock worth $509,890,000 after purchasing an additional 74,236 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Cowa LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Applied Materials during the first quarter worth about $76,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 75.22% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

AMAT has been the subject of a number of research reports. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on shares of Applied Materials from $132.00 to $140.00 in a research note on Friday, February 17th. Loop Capital started coverage on shares of Applied Materials in a research note on Tuesday, December 6th. They set a “buy” rating and a $125.00 price objective for the company. Morgan Stanley upped their price objective on shares of Applied Materials from $88.00 to $125.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 17th. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Applied Materials from $98.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 30th. Finally, Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of Applied Materials from $132.00 to $136.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 17th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and twenty-one have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Applied Materials presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $129.16.

Applied Materials Price Performance

Applied Materials stock opened at $118.48 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $100.13 billion, a PE ratio of 15.88, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 1.61. Applied Materials, Inc. has a 52-week low of $71.12 and a 52-week high of $142.01. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 2.31 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.41. The company’s 50 day moving average is $113.96 and its two-hundred day moving average is $101.27.

Applied Materials (NASDAQ:AMAT – Get Rating) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 16th. The manufacturing equipment provider reported $2.03 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.93 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $6.74 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $6.66 billion. Applied Materials had a net margin of 24.57% and a return on equity of 55.08%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 7.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $1.89 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Applied Materials, Inc. will post 7.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Applied Materials Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, May 25th will be issued a dividend of $0.32 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 24th. This is a positive change from Applied Materials’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. This represents a $1.28 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.08%. Applied Materials’s dividend payout ratio is 13.94%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Applied Materials news, SVP Teri A. Little sold 6,813 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total transaction of $800,118.72. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 98,332 shares in the company, valued at approximately $11,548,110.08. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. In related news, Director Xun Chen sold 377 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, January 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $107.80, for a total transaction of $40,640.60. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 39,868 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,297,770.40. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, SVP Teri A. Little sold 6,813 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, February 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total transaction of $800,118.72. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 98,332 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $11,548,110.08. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.25% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About Applied Materials

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Applied Materials, Inc provides manufacturing equipment, services and software to the semiconductor, display and related industries. It operates through the following segments: Semiconductor Systems, Applied Global Services, and Display & Adjacent Markets. The Semiconductor Systems segment includes semiconductor capital equipment for etch, rapid thermal processing, deposition, chemical mechanical planarization, metrology and inspection, wafer packaging, and ion implantation.