Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. Acquires New Shares in Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR)

Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. bought a new position in shares of Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The institutional investor bought 199 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $27,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Hennessy Advisors Inc. purchased a new position in Ingredion during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $58,642,000. Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its position in shares of Ingredion by 16.5% in the 4th quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 1,890,488 shares of the company’s stock worth $260,056,000 after acquiring an additional 268,389 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Ingredion by 55,219.9% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 174,811 shares of the company’s stock worth $240,240,000 after purchasing an additional 174,495 shares during the last quarter. Caisse DE Depot ET Placement DU Quebec bought a new stake in Ingredion during the third quarter valued at about $17,094,000. Finally, Franklin Resources Inc. grew its stake in Ingredion by 75.7% in the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 194,295 shares of the company’s stock valued at $26,109,000 after purchasing an additional 83,708 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 85.27% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have commented on INGR shares. Oppenheimer decreased their price target on shares of Ingredion from $178.00 to $167.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. BMO Capital Markets lowered their target price on shares of Ingredion from $147.00 to $133.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday. UBS Group increased their price objective on Ingredion from $165.00 to $173.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 15th. StockNews.com downgraded Ingredion from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Stephens decreased their price target on Ingredion from $155.00 to $150.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Ingredion currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $154.33.

Ingredion Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:INGR opened at $127.83 on Friday. Ingredion Incorporated has a twelve month low of $107.77 and a twelve month high of $155.44. The company has a current ratio of 2.67, a quick ratio of 1.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44. The company has a market cap of $8.33 billion, a PE ratio of 12.47, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.11 and a beta of 0.74. The company’s 50 day moving average is $138.01 and its 200 day moving average is $135.97.

Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $2.63 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.54 by $0.09. The company had revenue of $1.80 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.82 billion. Ingredion had a net margin of 9.05% and a return on equity of 17.75%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 6.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.65 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Ingredion Incorporated will post 10.59 EPS for the current year.

Ingredion Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, January 21st. Investors of record on Thursday, January 2nd were issued a dividend of $0.80 per share. This represents a $3.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.50%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, January 2nd. Ingredion’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 31.22%.

Insider Activity at Ingredion

In other news, CFO James D. Gray sold 54,869 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $146.76, for a total transaction of $8,052,574.44. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 12,795 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,877,794.20. This represents a 81.09 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, SVP Larry Fernandes sold 6,122 shares of Ingredion stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $140.66, for a total transaction of $861,120.52. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 29,034 shares in the company, valued at $4,083,922.44. This represents a 17.41 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 60,992 shares of company stock worth $8,913,841. 1.80% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About Ingredion

Ingredion Incorporated, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells sweeteners, starches, nutrition ingredients, and biomaterial solutions derived from wet milling and processing corn, and other starch-based materials to a range of industries in North America, South America, the Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.