Vicus Capital Boosts Stock Holdings in Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK)

Vicus Capital lifted its stake in Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) by 35.8% during the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 8,627 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 2,272 shares during the period. Vicus Capital’s holdings in Merck & Co., Inc. were worth $1,138,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of MRK. Algert Global LLC bought a new stake in shares of Merck & Co., Inc. during the 3rd quarter valued at about $454,000. Gateway Advisory LLC lifted its position in Merck & Co., Inc. by 9.2% during the 3rd quarter. Gateway Advisory LLC now owns 2,906 shares of the company’s stock valued at $299,000 after acquiring an additional 245 shares during the period. Insigneo Advisory Services LLC boosted its stake in Merck & Co., Inc. by 6.7% during the third quarter. Insigneo Advisory Services LLC now owns 20,302 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,105,000 after acquiring an additional 1,281 shares in the last quarter. Fairhaven Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Merck & Co., Inc. by 2.8% during the third quarter. Fairhaven Wealth Management LLC now owns 30,340 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,124,000 after purchasing an additional 831 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Truist Financial Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Merck & Co., Inc. by 1.8% during the third quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 4,060,789 shares of the company’s stock valued at $418,058,000 after purchasing an additional 73,170 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 76.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MRK has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Truist Financial raised their price objective on Merck & Co., Inc. from $142.00 to $143.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, April 26th. TheStreet lowered Merck & Co., Inc. from a “b+” rating to a “c+” rating in a research report on Monday, March 4th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of Merck & Co., Inc. from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 27th. Argus upgraded shares of Merck & Co., Inc. to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, June 5th. Finally, Berenberg Bank upped their target price on shares of Merck & Co., Inc. from $140.00 to $143.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, April 8th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $133.00.

Merck & Co., Inc. Stock Performance

MRK stock traded down $6.02 on Friday, hitting $123.80. The company had a trading volume of 57,055,458 shares, compared to its average volume of 8,215,418. The company has a current ratio of 1.25, a quick ratio of 0.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.77. Merck & Co., Inc. has a 12-month low of $99.14 and a 12-month high of $134.63. The stock has a market cap of $313.56 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 137.56, a P/E/G ratio of 2.51 and a beta of 0.39. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $129.32 and its 200 day simple moving average is $124.27.

Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 25th. The company reported $2.07 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.94 by $0.13. Merck & Co., Inc. had a return on equity of 14.05% and a net margin of 3.76%. The firm had revenue of $15.78 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $15.21 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.40 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 8.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Merck & Co., Inc. will post 8.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Merck & Co., Inc. Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, July 8th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 17th will be given a $0.77 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 17th. This represents a $3.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.49%. Merck & Co., Inc.’s payout ratio is 342.22%.

Merck & Co., Inc. Profile

Merck & Co, Inc operates as a healthcare company worldwide. It operates through two segments, Pharmaceutical and Animal Health. The Pharmaceutical segment offers human health pharmaceutical products in the areas of oncology, hospital acute care, immunology, neuroscience, virology, cardiovascular, and diabetes under the Keytruda, Bridion, Adempas, Lagevrio, Belsomra, Simponi, and Januvia brands, as well as vaccine products consisting of preventive pediatric, adolescent, and adult vaccines under the Gardasil/Gardasil 9, ProQuad, M-M-R II, Varivax, RotaTeq, Live Oral, Vaxneuvance, Pneumovax 23, and Vaqta names.