Toro (NYSE:TTC) Lifted to “Buy” at StockNews.com

StockNews.com upgraded shares of Toro (NYSE:TTC) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a research report report published on Monday morning.

TTC has been the topic of a number of other reports. DA Davidson lowered their target price on Toro from $103.00 to $88.00 and set a neutral rating on the stock in a research report on Monday. Northland Securities restated a market perform rating and issued a $100.00 price objective on shares of Toro in a research note on Friday, September 6th. Finally, Robert W. Baird reduced their price objective on Toro from $102.00 to $92.00 and set a neutral rating for the company in a research note on Friday, September 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Toro has an average rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $93.33.

Toro Stock Down 0.7 %

TTC stock opened at $82.22 on Monday. Toro has a 52 week low of $77.15 and a 52 week high of $102.00. The company has a quick ratio of 0.85, a current ratio of 1.94 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $91.21 and a 200 day simple moving average of $89.78. The company has a market cap of $8.44 billion, a PE ratio of 32.50 and a beta of 0.69.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, September 5th. The company reported $1.18 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.23 by ($0.05). Toro had a return on equity of 25.94% and a net margin of 8.89%. The firm had revenue of $1.16 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.26 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.95 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.9% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Toro will post 4.18 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Richard M. Olson sold 20,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $95.19, for a total value of $1,903,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 17,913 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,705,138.47. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. 1.62% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Toro

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in Toro by 0.7% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 10,565,128 shares of the company’s stock valued at $968,083,000 after acquiring an additional 73,719 shares during the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its holdings in shares of Toro by 25.0% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 6,653,109 shares of the company’s stock worth $609,626,000 after acquiring an additional 1,332,248 shares in the last quarter. Select Equity Group L.P. grew its holdings in shares of Toro by 1.6% in the second quarter. Select Equity Group L.P. now owns 5,519,407 shares of the company’s stock valued at $516,120,000 after purchasing an additional 88,536 shares in the last quarter. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC grew its holdings in Toro by 1.4% during the 2nd quarter. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC now owns 4,766,046 shares of the company’s stock valued at $445,673,000 after purchasing an additional 65,800 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Mairs & Power Inc. grew its stake in shares of Toro by 0.6% during the fourth quarter. Mairs & Power Inc. now owns 3,225,547 shares of the company’s stock valued at $309,620,000 after buying an additional 18,899 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 87.95% of the company’s stock.

Toro Company Profile

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.