Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” by Analysts

Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) has been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the sixteen research firms that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, eight have issued a hold recommendation and six have given a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price objective among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $127.63.

Several equities research analysts recently commented on CE shares. Robert W. Baird raised their target price on Celanese from $130.00 to $140.00 in a report on Wednesday, August 9th. StockNews.com downgraded Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 4th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded Celanese from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $135.00 to $122.00 in a report on Wednesday, August 9th. Piper Sandler downgraded Celanese from a “neutral” rating to an “underweight” rating and dropped their price objective for the stock from $120.00 to $112.00 in a report on Tuesday, August 29th. Finally, Citigroup lifted their price objective on Celanese from $130.00 to $133.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 4th.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Celanese

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in CE. AdvisorNet Financial Inc boosted its position in Celanese by 7.9% during the 1st quarter. AdvisorNet Financial Inc now owns 1,853 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $202,000 after purchasing an additional 136 shares during the period. NorthRock Partners LLC acquired a new position in Celanese during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $209,000. Global Retirement Partners LLC boosted its position in Celanese by 158.4% during the 1st quarter. Global Retirement Partners LLC now owns 323 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $33,000 after purchasing an additional 198 shares during the period. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC boosted its position in Celanese by 1.2% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 21,180 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $2,306,000 after purchasing an additional 247 shares during the period. Finally, BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S boosted its position in Celanese by 55.0% during the 1st quarter. BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S now owns 2,161 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $235,000 after purchasing an additional 767 shares during the period. 98.87% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Celanese Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:CE opened at $129.93 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $14.14 billion, a P/E ratio of 7.00, a PEG ratio of 4.61 and a beta of 1.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.77, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a current ratio of 1.63. Celanese has a one year low of $97.12 and a one year high of $131.05. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $121.26 and its 200 day simple moving average is $117.85.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its earnings results on Monday, November 6th. The basic materials company reported $2.50 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.20 by $0.30. The business had revenue of $2.72 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.76 billion. Celanese had a return on equity of 14.06% and a net margin of 18.93%. The company’s revenue was up 18.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business posted $3.94 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Celanese will post 9 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, November 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, October 30th were issued a $0.70 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, October 27th. This represents a $2.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.16%. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 15.09%.

Celanese Company Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.