Mather Group LLC. Grows Stock Holdings in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

Mather Group LLC. grew its stake in shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR) by 6.8% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 9,540 shares of the conglomerate’s stock after buying an additional 609 shares during the period. Mather Group LLC.’s holdings in Danaher were worth $2,190,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. FMR LLC grew its position in shares of Danaher by 15.8% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 23,617,424 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $6,566,116,000 after purchasing an additional 3,217,631 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its position in Danaher by 17.6% during the third quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 3,582,982 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $996,141,000 after buying an additional 535,254 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its stake in Danaher by 40,196.5% in the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 429,964 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $119,539,000 after acquiring an additional 428,897 shares during the last quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Danaher by 30.4% in the 3rd quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. now owns 1,705,884 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $465,617,000 after acquiring an additional 397,671 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Union Bancaire Privee UBP SA bought a new stake in shares of Danaher during the 4th quarter valued at about $74,551,000. 79.05% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently weighed in on DHR. Wells Fargo & Company decreased their price objective on shares of Danaher from $280.00 to $240.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. KeyCorp raised their price objective on shares of Danaher from $290.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Danaher from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $285.00 target price for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and set a $277.00 price target (down previously from $299.00) on shares of Danaher in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price objective on Danaher from $310.00 to $300.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 28th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $278.00.

Danaher Price Performance

DHR stock opened at $215.05 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $155.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 40.73, a PEG ratio of 2.80 and a beta of 0.83. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $234.93 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $252.88. The company has a current ratio of 1.40, a quick ratio of 1.05 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31. Danaher Co. has a 12-month low of $210.04 and a 12-month high of $281.70.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The conglomerate reported $2.14 EPS for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.14. Danaher had a return on equity of 10.82% and a net margin of 16.33%. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $2.09 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that Danaher Co. will post 7.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Danaher Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 31st. Investors of record on Friday, December 27th were issued a $0.27 dividend. This represents a $1.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.50%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, December 27th. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 20.45%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Danaher

In other Danaher news, SVP Brian W. Ellis sold 5,700 shares of Danaher stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, January 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $224.13, for a total transaction of $1,277,541.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 20,230 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,534,149.90. The trade was a 21.98 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Insiders own 10.90% of the company’s stock.

About Danaher

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.