Tower Bridge Advisors Buys Shares of 277 ASML Holding (NASDAQ:ASML)

Tower Bridge Advisors purchased a new position in shares of ASML Holding (NASDAQ:ASML) during the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm purchased 277 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock, valued at approximately $231,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in ASML. Van ECK Associates Corp lifted its stake in ASML by 37.0% in the third quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,757,049 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $1,464,061,000 after buying an additional 474,653 shares during the period. GQG Partners LLC grew its holdings in ASML by 21.6% during the first quarter. GQG Partners LLC now owns 1,657,878 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,608,921,000 after buying an additional 294,784 shares in the last quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its holdings in ASML by 18.9% during the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 1,220,210 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,184,173,000 after buying an additional 194,357 shares in the last quarter. Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV grew its holdings in ASML by 4,379.6% during the second quarter. Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV now owns 889,875 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $910,102,000 after buying an additional 870,010 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its stake in ASML by 0.3% in the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 817,709 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $836,300,000 after purchasing an additional 2,085 shares during the period. 26.07% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have recently commented on the company. Morgan Stanley cut ASML from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Sanford C. Bernstein reduced their price objective on ASML from $1,052.00 to $815.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, October 21st. Susquehanna reduced their price target on ASML from $1,300.00 to $1,100.00 and set a “positive” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, October 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price target on ASML from $1,207.00 to $1,148.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. Finally, Barclays upgraded ASML from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 30th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, nine have given a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $970.60.

ASML Price Performance

Shares of ASML stock opened at $658.63 on Monday. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $756.70 and its 200-day simple moving average is $881.85. ASML Holding has a 52 week low of $654.77 and a 52 week high of $1,110.09. The company has a market capitalization of $259.12 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.48, a PEG ratio of 1.90 and a beta of 1.51. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 1.55 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.29.

ASML (NASDAQ:ASML) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 15th. The semiconductor company reported $5.80 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $5.24 by $0.56. The company had revenue of $8.21 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.66 billion. ASML had a return on equity of 47.61% and a net margin of 26.40%. As a group, analysts expect that ASML Holding will post 20.77 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

ASML Cuts Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, November 7th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, October 29th were paid a dividend of $1.407 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, October 29th. This represents a $5.63 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.85%. ASML’s payout ratio is currently 29.21%.

ASML Profile

ASML Holding N.V. develops, produces, markets, sells, and services advanced semiconductor equipment systems for chipmakers. It offers advanced semiconductor equipment systems, including lithography, metrology, and inspection systems. The company also provides extreme ultraviolet lithography systems; and deep ultraviolet lithography systems comprising immersion and dry lithography solutions to manufacture various range of semiconductor nodes and technologies.