Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) Shares Sold by Cypress Capital Group

Cypress Capital Group decreased its position in shares of Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) by 13.5% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,637 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 255 shares during the quarter. Cypress Capital Group’s holdings in Garmin were worth $338,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Citigroup Inc. grew its position in Garmin by 123.2% in the 3rd quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 283,412 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $49,889,000 after buying an additional 156,441 shares in the last quarter. Passumpsic Savings Bank bought a new position in Garmin in the 3rd quarter valued at about $3,137,000. Advisors Asset Management Inc. grew its position in Garmin by 24.2% in the 3rd quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 17,529 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $3,086,000 after buying an additional 3,415 shares in the last quarter. National Pension Service grew its position in Garmin by 25.7% in the 3rd quarter. National Pension Service now owns 284,065 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $50,004,000 after buying an additional 58,025 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Diversified Trust Co bought a new position in Garmin in the 4th quarter valued at about $734,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 81.60% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently weighed in on GRMN. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Garmin to a “sell” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $164.00 to $171.00 in a research report on Tuesday, February 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on shares of Garmin from $219.00 to $260.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 20th. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on shares of Garmin from $265.00 to $285.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 26th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on shares of Garmin from $158.00 to $188.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 20th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $210.80.

Garmin Stock Up 2.2 %

Shares of Garmin stock opened at $224.97 on Thursday. Garmin Ltd. has a 12-month low of $138.86 and a 12-month high of $246.50. The stock has a market cap of $43.29 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.78, a P/E/G ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 0.98. The business’s 50 day moving average is $215.85 and its 200-day moving average is $198.87.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 19th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $2.41 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.90 by $0.51. Garmin had a return on equity of 19.31% and a net margin of 22.42%. The firm had revenue of $1.82 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.70 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.72 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 22.9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Garmin Ltd. will post 7.8 EPS for the current year.

Garmin Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 27th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be given a $0.90 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 13th. This represents a $3.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.60%. Garmin’s dividend payout ratio is presently 41.04%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Garmin

In other news, COO Patrick Desbois sold 6,911 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $227.15, for a total transaction of $1,569,833.65. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 63,048 shares in the company, valued at $14,321,353.20. This trade represents a 9.88 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Douglas G. Boessen sold 1,761 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $207.99, for a total value of $366,270.39. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 27,612 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,743,019.88. This represents a 6.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 23,274 shares of company stock worth $5,242,686. 19.54% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

About Garmin

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.