James Investment Research Inc. Trims Stock Position in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

James Investment Research Inc. decreased its position in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) by 5.5% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 6,108 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 356 shares during the quarter. James Investment Research Inc.’s holdings in Celanese were worth $830,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in CE. Norden Group LLC acquired a new position in shares of Celanese in the first quarter worth $363,000. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. grew its stake in shares of Celanese by 16.9% in the first quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 1,659 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $285,000 after acquiring an additional 240 shares in the last quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp grew its stake in shares of Celanese by 25.3% in the first quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 14,475 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,488,000 after acquiring an additional 2,923 shares in the last quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. grew its stake in shares of Celanese by 109.2% in the first quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 24,047 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $4,133,000 after acquiring an additional 12,553 shares in the last quarter. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets grew its stake in shares of Celanese by 41.4% in the first quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 128,423 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $22,071,000 after acquiring an additional 37,577 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 98.87% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently commented on CE. Bank of America lowered their target price on shares of Celanese from $137.00 to $128.00 and set an “underperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, August 12th. KeyCorp downgraded shares of Celanese from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Monday, October 7th. Vertical Research downgraded shares of Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $130.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Wells Fargo & Company decreased their price objective on shares of Celanese from $180.00 to $165.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on shares of Celanese from $193.00 to $184.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Celanese has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $151.44.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Celanese news, COO Scott A. Richardson sold 4,675 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $129.51, for a total transaction of $605,459.25. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 69,754 shares in the company, valued at approximately $9,033,840.54. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. 0.33% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Celanese Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:CE opened at $124.81 on Friday. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $129.74 and a 200-day simple moving average of $138.70. Celanese Co. has a one year low of $114.05 and a one year high of $172.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.45, a quick ratio of 0.74 and a current ratio of 1.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $13.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.10, a PEG ratio of 0.74 and a beta of 1.30.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The basic materials company reported $2.38 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.71 by ($0.33). The firm had revenue of $2.65 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.76 billion. Celanese had a return on equity of 13.60% and a net margin of 18.24%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 5.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.17 earnings per share. On average, analysts predict that Celanese Co. will post 10.24 EPS for the current year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, November 13th. Investors of record on Wednesday, October 30th will be issued a dividend of $0.70 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, October 30th. This represents a $2.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.24%. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio is currently 15.94%.

Celanese Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.