Pekin Hardy Strauss Inc. Trims Stake in The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS)

Pekin Hardy Strauss Inc. lessened its position in The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS) by 8.1% in the third quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 316,445 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 27,932 shares during the quarter. Mosaic accounts for approximately 1.1% of Pekin Hardy Strauss Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 17th biggest holding. Pekin Hardy Strauss Inc.’s holdings in Mosaic were worth $8,474,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in shares of Mosaic by 1,815.5% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,682,108 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $346,743,000 after purchasing an additional 10,124,427 shares in the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its position in Mosaic by 34.6% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 6,337,124 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $183,155,000 after buying an additional 1,628,850 shares in the last quarter. Boston Partners raised its stake in Mosaic by 1,795.5% during the first quarter. Boston Partners now owns 1,279,022 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $41,496,000 after buying an additional 1,211,544 shares during the last quarter. Swedbank AB bought a new stake in Mosaic in the first quarter worth $37,936,000. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its stake in shares of Mosaic by 44.2% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 3,218,410 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $86,189,000 after acquiring an additional 986,812 shares during the last quarter. 77.54% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price target on Mosaic from $29.00 to $27.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, September 24th. Mizuho raised their price objective on shares of Mosaic from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 13th. Royal Bank of Canada reiterated a “sector perform” rating and issued a $30.00 target price on shares of Mosaic in a research note on Thursday, November 14th. Finally, Barclays reduced their price target on shares of Mosaic from $32.00 to $30.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, October 11th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Mosaic presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $33.22.

Mosaic Stock Performance

Shares of MOS stock opened at $26.03 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.49, a current ratio of 1.19 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $26.44 and a 200-day moving average price of $27.79. The Mosaic Company has a 52 week low of $24.11 and a 52 week high of $38.30. The firm has a market capitalization of $8.27 billion, a PE ratio of 23.04, a P/E/G ratio of 1.77 and a beta of 1.35.

Mosaic (NYSE:MOS) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, November 12th. The basic materials company reported $0.34 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.58 by ($0.24). The company had revenue of $2.81 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.17 billion. Mosaic had a return on equity of 6.00% and a net margin of 3.24%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 20.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.68 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts expect that The Mosaic Company will post 2.11 earnings per share for the current year.

Mosaic Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 19th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 5th will be issued a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.23%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 5th. Mosaic’s dividend payout ratio is 74.34%.

Mosaic Profile

The Mosaic Company, through its subsidiaries, produces and markets concentrated phosphate and potash crop nutrients in North America and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Phosphates, Potash, and Mosaic Fertilizantes. It owns and operates mines, which produce concentrated phosphate crop nutrients, such as diammonium phosphate, monoammonium phosphate, and ammoniated phosphate products; and phosphate-based animal feed ingredients primarily under the Biofos and Nexfos brand names, as well as produces a double sulfate of potash magnesia product under K-Mag brand name.