Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC Increases Position in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI)

Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC increased its stake in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) by 3.8% in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,439 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after acquiring an additional 163 shares during the period. Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC’s holdings in Crown Castle were worth $463,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CCI. CHICAGO TRUST Co NA increased its holdings in Crown Castle by 3.0% in the first quarter. CHICAGO TRUST Co NA now owns 3,532 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $368,000 after buying an additional 104 shares in the last quarter. IFP Advisors Inc increased its holdings in Crown Castle by 5.9% in the fourth quarter. IFP Advisors Inc now owns 2,373 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $216,000 after buying an additional 133 shares in the last quarter. Howard Capital Management Inc. increased its holdings in Crown Castle by 1.2% in the fourth quarter. Howard Capital Management Inc. now owns 11,475 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $1,041,000 after buying an additional 135 shares in the last quarter. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in Crown Castle by 5.9% in the fourth quarter. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC now owns 2,526 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $227,000 after buying an additional 141 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Providence Capital Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Crown Castle by 0.7% in the fourth quarter. Providence Capital Advisors LLC now owns 22,668 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $2,057,000 after buying an additional 150 shares in the last quarter. 90.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have recently commented on CCI. Raymond James raised shares of Crown Castle from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and cut their target price for the stock from $128.00 to $122.00 in a research note on Friday, March 14th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on shares of Crown Castle from $107.00 to $112.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. UBS Group raised shares of Crown Castle from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $118.00 price target for the company in a research note on Friday, March 14th. Argus upgraded shares of Crown Castle to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Citigroup increased their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $108.00 to $124.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, May 5th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and three have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $112.71.

Crown Castle Stock Down 1.7%

CCI stock opened at $98.29 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 0.54 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.43. Crown Castle Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $84.20 and a fifty-two week high of $120.92. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $101.01 and its 200 day simple moving average is $96.94. The stock has a market cap of $42.80 billion, a PE ratio of 34.85 and a beta of 0.88.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 30th. The real estate investment trust reported $1.10 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.72 by ($0.62). The firm had revenue of $1.06 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.04 billion. Crown Castle had a return on equity of 20.98% and a net margin of 18.59%. The firm’s revenue was down 4.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.72 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Crown Castle Inc. will post 6.67 EPS for the current year.

Crown Castle Cuts Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 30th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 13th will be paid a dividend of $1.0625 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 13th. This represents a $4.25 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.32%. Crown Castle’s payout ratio is -39.50%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Crown Castle

In other news, EVP Edward B. Adams, Jr. sold 8,000 shares of Crown Castle stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $106.37, for a total value of $850,960.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 20,528 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,183,563.36. The trade was a 28.04% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, VP Robert Sean Collins sold 3,600 shares of Crown Castle stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $106.72, for a total transaction of $384,192.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 6,465 shares in the company, valued at $689,944.80. This represents a 35.77% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 31,600 shares of company stock valued at $3,362,752. Company insiders own 0.10% of the company’s stock.

Crown Castle Profile

Crown Castle owns, operates and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and approximately 90,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market. This nationwide portfolio of communications infrastructure connects cities and communities to essential data, technology and wireless service – bringing information, ideas and innovations to the people and businesses that need them.