Veritable L.P. Reduces Stock Holdings in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI)

Veritable L.P. lowered its stake in shares of Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) by 5.8% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 11,950 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after selling 740 shares during the quarter. Veritable L.P.’s holdings in Crown Castle were worth $1,362,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Moors & Cabot Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 3.4% during the 1st quarter. Moors & Cabot Inc. now owns 2,734 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $505,000 after purchasing an additional 91 shares during the period. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Crown Castle by 33.4% in the first quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 3,954 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $730,000 after purchasing an additional 991 shares during the last quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P boosted its position in shares of Crown Castle by 4,497.6% during the first quarter. Loomis Sayles & Co. L P now owns 5,701 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $1,052,000 after buying an additional 5,577 shares during the period. Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 12.3% during the first quarter. Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. now owns 4,802 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $886,000 after buying an additional 525 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Covestor Ltd raised its holdings in shares of Crown Castle by 205.9% in the first quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 878 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $162,000 after buying an additional 591 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.27% of the company’s stock.

Crown Castle Trading Up 0.9 %

CCI opened at $104.14 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.44, a quick ratio of 0.44 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.28. The firm has a market cap of $45.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.09, a PEG ratio of 2.54 and a beta of 0.66. Crown Castle Inc. has a 12 month low of $84.72 and a 12 month high of $153.98. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $93.89 and a 200-day moving average price of $104.55.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 19th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.61 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.69 by ($1.08). The company had revenue of $1.67 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.70 billion. Crown Castle had a net margin of 21.93% and a return on equity of 21.85%. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $1.85 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Crown Castle Inc. will post 7.14 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Crown Castle Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 29th. Investors of record on Friday, December 15th will be given a dividend of $1.565 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 14th. This represents a $6.26 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 6.01%. Crown Castle’s payout ratio is 174.86%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

CCI has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Barclays dropped their price objective on Crown Castle from $137.00 to $116.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, July 24th. Bank of America cut shares of Crown Castle from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $115.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Thursday, August 10th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered shares of Crown Castle from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and decreased their price objective for the company from $125.00 to $100.00 in a report on Monday, October 16th. Raymond James dropped their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $126.00 to $104.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, October 20th. Finally, StockNews.com initiated coverage on shares of Crown Castle in a research note on Thursday, October 5th. They set a “hold” rating for the company. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Crown Castle has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $125.56.

About Crown Castle

Crown Castle owns, operates and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and approximately 85,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market. This nationwide portfolio of communications infrastructure connects cities and communities to essential data, technology and wireless service – bringing information, ideas and innovations to the people and businesses that need them.