Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Boosts Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) Price Target to $82.00

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) had its target price raised by Keefe, Bruyette & Woods from $80.00 to $82.00 in a report released on Friday morning, Benzinga reports. They currently have an underperform rating on the financial services provider’s stock.

A number of other equities research analysts have also recently issued reports on the company. Jefferies Financial Group cut Brown & Brown from a buy rating to a hold rating and lowered their price objective for the company from $85.00 to $78.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 9th. Raymond James boosted their price target on shares of Brown & Brown from $90.00 to $95.00 and gave the company an outperform rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 26th. UBS Group raised their price objective on shares of Brown & Brown from $75.00 to $81.00 and gave the stock a neutral rating in a report on Monday, January 29th. StockNews.com raised shares of Brown & Brown from a hold rating to a buy rating in a report on Sunday, March 17th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada increased their target price on Brown & Brown from $87.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 20th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus price target of $87.30.

Brown & Brown Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:BRO opened at $84.21 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.97, a quick ratio of 1.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.52. The stock has a market cap of $24.02 billion, a PE ratio of 25.91, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.28 and a beta of 0.79. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $84.18 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $77.78. Brown & Brown has a 1-year low of $61.71 and a 1-year high of $87.99.

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The financial services provider reported $1.14 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.07 by $0.07. Brown & Brown had a return on equity of 16.43% and a net margin of 21.09%. The firm had revenue of $1.26 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.22 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.84 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 12.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that Brown & Brown will post 3.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Brown & Brown Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 6th will be given a $0.13 dividend. This represents a $0.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.62%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 3rd. Brown & Brown’s payout ratio is 16.00%.

Insider Activity at Brown & Brown

In related news, Chairman Hyatt J. Brown sold 144,323 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $85.96, for a total value of $12,406,005.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chairman now owns 37,460,605 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,220,113,605.80. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 16.43% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Brown & Brown

Hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Fortitude Family Office LLC bought a new stake in Brown & Brown during the 4th quarter valued at about $31,000. Park Place Capital Corp grew its holdings in shares of Brown & Brown by 166.5% during the fourth quarter. Park Place Capital Corp now owns 509 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $36,000 after buying an additional 318 shares during the last quarter. Alaska Permanent Fund Corp bought a new stake in shares of Brown & Brown during the first quarter valued at approximately $36,000. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt raised its holdings in Brown & Brown by 174.0% in the 4th quarter. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt now owns 548 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $39,000 after acquiring an additional 348 shares during the last quarter. Finally, First PREMIER Bank bought a new position in Brown & Brown in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $40,000. Institutional investors own 71.01% of the company’s stock.

About Brown & Brown

Brown & Brown, Inc markets and sells insurance products and services in the United States, Canada, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and internationally. It operates through four segments: Retail, National Programs, Wholesale Brokerage, and Services. The Retail segment provides property and casualty, employee benefits insurance products, personal insurance products, specialties insurance products, risk management strategies, loss control survey and analysis, consultancy, and claims processing services.