The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) Given Consensus Rating of “Hold” by Brokerages

The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) has been assigned an average rating of “Hold” from the four research firms that are covering the firm, MarketBeat.com reports. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and one has assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price objective among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $98.75.

TTC has been the topic of several recent research reports. Robert W. Baird increased their price target on shares of Toro from $90.00 to $100.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, June 7th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Toro from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 20th. Finally, DA Davidson increased their price target on shares of Toro from $93.00 to $95.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 14th.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Richard M. Olson sold 20,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, June 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $95.19, for a total transaction of $1,903,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 17,913 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,705,138.47. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Insiders own 1.62% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Toro

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its stake in shares of Toro by 25.0% in the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 6,653,109 shares of the company’s stock worth $609,626,000 after buying an additional 1,332,248 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Toro in the 4th quarter worth $103,785,000. Wellington Management Group LLP grew its stake in shares of Toro by 73.8% in the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,845,724 shares of the company’s stock worth $177,171,000 after buying an additional 783,794 shares in the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc grew its stake in shares of Toro by 334.2% in the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 818,260 shares of the company’s stock worth $78,545,000 after buying an additional 629,820 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Epoch Investment Partners Inc. grew its stake in shares of Toro by 250.5% in the 4th quarter. Epoch Investment Partners Inc. now owns 459,717 shares of the company’s stock worth $44,128,000 after buying an additional 328,550 shares in the last quarter. 87.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Toro Trading Up 1.4 %

Shares of TTC stock opened at $93.51 on Friday. Toro has a 12-month low of $77.15 and a 12-month high of $106.68. The company has a current ratio of 1.93, a quick ratio of 0.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61. The firm’s 50 day moving average is $88.84 and its 200 day moving average is $90.61. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.71 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.96 and a beta of 0.67.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, June 6th. The company reported $1.40 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.29 by $0.11. Toro had a net margin of 6.00% and a return on equity of 25.04%. The company had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.34 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $1.58 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up .7% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts expect that Toro will post 4.33 earnings per share for the current year.

Toro Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, June 11th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, June 18th were given a dividend of $0.36 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, June 18th. This represents a $1.44 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.54%. Toro’s payout ratio is 56.92%.

Toro Company Profile

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.