Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) Shares Purchased by Magnetar Financial LLC

Magnetar Financial LLC raised its stake in shares of Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR) by 606.2% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 38,023 shares of the company’s stock after acquiring an additional 32,639 shares during the period. Magnetar Financial LLC owned approximately 0.06% of Ingredion worth $5,230,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. BOK Financial Private Wealth Inc. purchased a new stake in Ingredion during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. purchased a new stake in Ingredion during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Prospera Private Wealth LLC purchased a new stake in Ingredion during the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $41,000. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC raised its stake in Ingredion by 32.4% during the 4th quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 323 shares of the company’s stock valued at $44,000 after acquiring an additional 79 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Crews Bank & Trust purchased a new stake in Ingredion during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $48,000. 85.27% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

INGR has been the subject of several analyst reports. Stephens reduced their price objective on Ingredion from $155.00 to $150.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. StockNews.com downgraded Ingredion from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on Ingredion from $147.00 to $133.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Finally, Oppenheimer cut their target price on Ingredion from $178.00 to $167.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 5th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $158.20.

Ingredion Stock Performance

Shares of INGR stock opened at $132.41 on Thursday. Ingredion Incorporated has a 12-month low of $109.51 and a 12-month high of $155.44. The company has a market cap of $8.50 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.64, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.03 and a beta of 0.75. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $131.55 and a 200-day simple moving average of $136.54. The company has a current ratio of 2.62, a quick ratio of 1.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.47.

Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $2.63 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.54 by $0.09. Ingredion had a return on equity of 18.62% and a net margin of 8.71%. The firm had revenue of $1.80 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.82 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.65 EPS. Ingredion’s quarterly revenue was down 6.3% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities analysts forecast that Ingredion Incorporated will post 11.14 EPS for the current year.

Ingredion Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 22nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, April 1st will be paid a $0.80 dividend. This represents a $3.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.42%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, April 1st. Ingredion’s payout ratio is currently 32.96%.

Insider Activity at Ingredion

In other Ingredion news, CEO James P. Zallie sold 10,815 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $125.88, for a total transaction of $1,361,392.20. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 34,127 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,295,906.76. This represents a 24.06 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. 1.80% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Ingredion Profile

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.