StockNews.com Downgrades Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) to Buy

StockNews.com lowered shares of Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) from a strong-buy rating to a buy rating in a research note published on Thursday.

Several other brokerages also recently issued reports on INGR. Oppenheimer reduced their price target on shares of Ingredion from $178.00 to $167.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday. Barclays lifted their price target on Ingredion from $145.00 to $168.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 6th. BMO Capital Markets decreased their price objective on Ingredion from $147.00 to $133.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday. Stephens cut their target price on Ingredion from $155.00 to $150.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, UBS Group lifted their price objective on shares of Ingredion from $165.00 to $173.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 15th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $154.33.

Ingredion Trading Up 0.8 %

NYSE INGR opened at $127.34 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44, a current ratio of 2.67 and a quick ratio of 1.69. Ingredion has a 12 month low of $107.77 and a 12 month high of $155.44. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $138.40 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $136.03. The company has a market capitalization of $8.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.42, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.11 and a beta of 0.74.

Ingredion (NYSE:INGR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The company reported $2.63 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.54 by $0.09. The firm 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 revenue was down 6.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.65 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts predict that Ingredion will post 10.59 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Ingredion Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, January 21st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 2nd were issued a dividend of $0.80 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, January 2nd. This represents a $3.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.51%. Ingredion’s dividend payout ratio is 31.22%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Ingredion news, CFO James D. Gray sold 54,869 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $146.76, for a total value of $8,052,574.44. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 12,795 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,877,794.20. The trade was a 81.09 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 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 of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,083,922.44. The trade was a 17.41 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 60,992 shares of company stock worth $8,913,841. 1.80% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of Ingredion

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in INGR. Assetmark Inc. boosted its position in Ingredion by 38,341.7% during the fourth quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 509,352 shares of the company’s stock worth $70,067,000 after purchasing an additional 508,027 shares during the period. Hennessy Advisors Inc. bought a new position in shares of Ingredion in the fourth quarter worth about $58,642,000. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its stake in Ingredion by 16.5% during the 4th quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 1,890,488 shares of the company’s stock valued at $260,056,000 after purchasing an additional 268,389 shares during the period. Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new stake in Ingredion in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $31,752,000. Finally, International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Ingredion by 55,219.9% during the third quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 174,811 shares of the company’s stock worth $240,240,000 after buying an additional 174,495 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 85.27% of the company’s stock.

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.