New York State Teachers Retirement System Trims Stake in Bread Financial Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:BFH)

New York State Teachers Retirement System lowered its holdings in Bread Financial Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:BFH) by 6.8% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 70,816 shares of the company’s stock after selling 5,165 shares during the quarter. New York State Teachers Retirement System owned 0.14% of Bread Financial worth $2,333,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in BFH. Royal Bank of Canada acquired a new stake in shares of Bread Financial in the third quarter valued at $948,000. Macquarie Group Ltd. acquired a new stake in shares of Bread Financial in the third quarter valued at $44,000. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Bread Financial in the third quarter valued at $153,464,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp acquired a new stake in shares of Bread Financial in the third quarter valued at $21,151,000. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP acquired a new stake in shares of Bread Financial in the third quarter valued at $3,333,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.52% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on BFH. Evercore ISI cut Bread Financial from an “in-line” rating to an “underperform” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $29.00 to $33.00 in a research note on Wednesday, January 3rd. Oppenheimer upgraded Bread Financial from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $52.00 price target on the stock in a report on Friday, January 26th. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price target on Bread Financial from $27.00 to $31.00 and gave the stock a “sell” rating in a report on Monday, December 18th. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed a “sector perform” rating and set a $36.00 price objective on shares of Bread Financial in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on Bread Financial from $36.00 to $40.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Bread Financial has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $36.55.

Insider Transactions at Bread Financial

In other news, major shareholder Turtle Creek Asset Management sold 30,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, January 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $29.86, for a total transaction of $895,800.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 304,769 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,100,402.34. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. In the last three months, insiders sold 195,000 shares of company stock valued at $6,323,850. Corporate insiders own 0.62% of the company’s stock.

Bread Financial Stock Down 1.4 %

Bread Financial stock opened at $33.79 on Tuesday. Bread Financial Holdings, Inc. has a twelve month low of $23.19 and a twelve month high of $41.89. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $36.79 and a two-hundred day moving average of $32.88. The company has a current ratio of 1.18, a quick ratio of 1.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.48. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.67 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 2.36, a PEG ratio of 0.12 and a beta of 1.93.

Bread Financial (NYSE:BFH) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 25th. The company reported $0.90 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.67) by $1.57. Bread Financial had a return on equity of 26.24% and a net margin of 13.87%. The company had revenue of $1,000.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $984.36 million. During the same period last year, the firm earned ($2.68) EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 3.2% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts expect that Bread Financial Holdings, Inc. will post 7.03 earnings per share for the current year.

Bread Financial Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 9th were paid a dividend of $0.21 per share. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.49%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, February 8th. Bread Financial’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 5.87%.

About Bread Financial

Bread Financial Holdings, Inc provides tech-forward payment and lending solutions to customers and consumer-based industries in North America. It offers credit card and other loans financing services, including risk management solutions, account origination, and funding services for private label and co-brand credit card programs, as well as through Bread partnerships; and Comenity-branded general purpose cash-back credit.