Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) Upgraded by Bank of America to “Neutral”

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) was upgraded by equities research analysts at Bank of America from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday, Briefing.com reports. The brokerage currently has a $101.00 price target on the financial services provider’s stock, up from their previous price target of $91.00. Bank of America‘s price objective would suggest a potential upside of 12.41% from the stock’s current price.

Several other brokerages also recently issued reports on BRO. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $75.00 to $81.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, January 29th. Raymond James boosted their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $90.00 to $95.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 26th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Brown & Brown from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 8th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $84.00 to $85.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 24th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upped their price target on shares of Brown & Brown from $80.00 to $82.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research note on Friday, May 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $88.80.

Brown & Brown Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE BRO opened at $89.85 on Wednesday. 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 50 day simple moving average of $84.87 and a 200-day simple moving average of $79.25. The company has a market cap of $25.63 billion, a PE ratio of 27.65, a P/E/G ratio of 2.46 and a beta of 0.79. Brown & Brown has a 12-month low of $61.71 and a 12-month high of $90.50.

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 23rd. The financial services provider reported $1.14 EPS for the quarter, beating 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 company had revenue of $1.26 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.22 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.84 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 12.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Brown & Brown will post 3.61 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Brown & Brown

In other Brown & Brown news, Chairman Hyatt J. Brown sold 144,323 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $85.96, for a total transaction of $12,406,005.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chairman now directly owns 37,460,605 shares in the company, valued at $3,220,113,605.80. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 16.43% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Brown & Brown

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Atria Investments Inc lifted its stake in shares of Brown & Brown by 19.0% in the first quarter. Atria Investments Inc now owns 23,701 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $2,075,000 after buying an additional 3,780 shares during the period. Virtu Financial LLC acquired a new position in Brown & Brown in the first quarter worth about $672,000. National Wealth Management Group LLC acquired a new position in Brown & Brown in the first quarter worth about $452,000. Plato Investment Management Ltd acquired a new position in Brown & Brown in the first quarter worth about $609,000. Finally, WealthPlan Investment Management LLC acquired a new position in Brown & Brown in the first quarter worth about $9,270,000. 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.