Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) Sees Large Decline in Short Interest

Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) saw a significant decrease in short interest during the month of March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 1,720,000 shares, a decrease of 16.9% from the March 15th total of 2,070,000 shares. Approximately 2.7% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 637,500 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 2.7 days.

Insider Activity at Ingredion

In other news, CEO James P. Zallie sold 10,815 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $125.88, for a total transaction of $1,361,392.20. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 34,127 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,295,906.76. This represents a 24.06 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 1.80% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Ingredion by 1.2% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 7,285,705 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,002,222,000 after buying an additional 84,863 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Ingredion by 16.5% in the 4th quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 1,890,488 shares of the company’s stock valued at $260,056,000 after purchasing an additional 268,389 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Ingredion by 1.3% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,182,434 shares of the company’s stock worth $162,703,000 after purchasing an additional 14,741 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in shares of Ingredion by 5.7% during the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 870,317 shares of the company’s stock valued at $119,721,000 after purchasing an additional 46,819 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Allianz Asset Management GmbH increased its holdings in Ingredion by 11.9% during the fourth quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 842,763 shares of the company’s stock valued at $115,930,000 after buying an additional 89,335 shares during the period. 85.27% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have commented on INGR shares. Stephens dropped their price objective on shares of Ingredion from $155.00 to $150.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Oppenheimer reduced their price objective on Ingredion from $178.00 to $167.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. StockNews.com lowered Ingredion from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on Ingredion from $147.00 to $133.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, February 5th. Finally, UBS Group restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $145.00 price target (down from $165.00) on shares of Ingredion in a research report on Monday, April 7th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $152.60.

Ingredion Stock Performance

INGR stock opened at $129.59 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $8.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.35, a PEG ratio of 1.03 and a beta of 0.72. Ingredion has a twelve month low of $111.54 and a twelve month high of $155.44. The company has a quick ratio of 1.69, a current ratio of 2.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.47. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $130.50 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $135.77.

Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $2.63 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.54 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.80 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.82 billion. Ingredion had a net margin of 8.71% and a return on equity of 18.62%. The firm’s revenue was down 6.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.65 EPS. Analysts predict that Ingredion will post 11.14 earnings per share for the current year.

Ingredion Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 22nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, April 1st will be issued a $0.80 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, April 1st. This represents a $3.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.47%. Ingredion’s payout ratio is 32.96%.

About Ingredion

Ingredion Incorporated, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells sweeteners, starches, nutrition ingredients, and biomaterial solutions derived from wet milling and processing corn, and other starch-based materials to a range of industries in North America, South America, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.