Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) Short Interest Down 21.0% in March

Veralto Co. (NYSE:VLTO) saw a significant decline in short interest during the month of March. As of March 15th, there was short interest totalling 3,530,000 shares, a decline of 21.0% from the February 28th total of 4,470,000 shares. Based on an average trading volume of 1,460,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 2.4 days. Currently, 1.5% of the shares of the stock are sold short.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have recently commented on VLTO shares. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price target on Veralto from $111.00 to $110.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. Jefferies Financial Group started coverage on Veralto in a report on Thursday, December 12th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $125.00 price target for the company. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on Veralto from $116.00 to $110.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, Citigroup dropped their target price on shares of Veralto from $118.00 to $116.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, January 13th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $113.50.

Veralto Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE VLTO opened at $95.97 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a quick ratio of 1.69 and a current ratio of 1.92. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $99.48 and a 200 day moving average price of $103.94. The stock has a market capitalization of $23.76 billion, a PE ratio of 28.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.24 and a beta of 1.11. Veralto has a 52 week low of $85.91 and a 52 week high of $115.00.

Veralto (NYSE:VLTO) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.90 by $0.05. Veralto had a net margin of 16.04% and a return on equity of 49.29%. Analysts predict that Veralto will post 3.66 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Veralto Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 30th. Investors of record on Monday, March 31st will be issued a dividend of $0.11 per share. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.46%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 31st. Veralto’s payout ratio is currently 13.17%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, SVP Surekha Trivedi sold 590 shares of Veralto stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $100.35, for a total value of $59,206.50. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 8,470 shares in the company, valued at $849,964.50. This trade represents a 6.51 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Jennifer Honeycutt sold 10,414 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $98.56, for a total transaction of $1,026,403.84. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 116,637 shares in the company, valued at $11,495,742.72. This trade represents a 8.20 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders sold 21,881 shares of company stock valued at $2,176,770. Insiders own 0.31% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Veralto

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Veralto in the fourth quarter valued at about $289,028,000. First Trust Advisors LP grew its stake in Veralto by 222.3% in the 4th quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 2,602,399 shares of the company’s stock valued at $265,054,000 after buying an additional 1,794,992 shares during the last quarter. Champlain Investment Partners LLC bought a new position in Veralto in the 4th quarter valued at about $133,058,000. Nordea Investment Management AB lifted its position in Veralto by 34.6% during the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 3,923,747 shares of the company’s stock worth $400,928,000 after acquiring an additional 1,009,170 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets bought a new stake in shares of Veralto during the fourth quarter worth approximately $96,888,000. Institutional investors own 91.28% of the company’s stock.

About Veralto

Veralto Corporation provides water analytics, water treatment, marking and coding, and packaging and color services worldwide. It operates through two segments, Water Quality (WQ) and Product Quality & Innovation (PQI). The WQ segment offers precision instrumentation and water treatment technologies to measure, analyze, and treat water in residential, commercial, municipal, industrial, research, and natural resource applications through the Hach, Trojan Technologies, and ChemTreat brands.