Ameritas Investment Partners Inc. Reduces Stake in Avient Co. (NYSE:AVNT)

Ameritas Investment Partners Inc. cut its holdings in shares of Avient Co. (NYSE:AVNT) by 1.5% in the second quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 57,336 shares of the company’s stock after selling 890 shares during the quarter. Ameritas Investment Partners Inc. owned 0.06% of Avient worth $2,503,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the business. Headlands Technologies LLC purchased a new position in shares of Avient during the first quarter worth $35,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its position in Avient by 88.6% during the 2nd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 811 shares of the company’s stock worth $35,000 after purchasing an additional 381 shares during the period. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale purchased a new position in shares of Avient during the 2nd quarter valued at about $59,000. Innealta Capital LLC acquired a new position in shares of Avient in the 2nd quarter valued at about $119,000. Finally, Lazard Asset Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Avient in the first quarter worth about $133,000. 95.48% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upgraded Avient from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $49.00 to $52.00 in a research report on Wednesday, August 7th.

Avient Stock Down 1.8 %

AVNT opened at $48.10 on Friday. The company has a fifty day moving average of $46.06 and a two-hundred day moving average of $44.19. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a quick ratio of 0.73 and a current ratio of 0.97. Avient Co. has a fifty-two week low of $27.73 and a fifty-two week high of $49.47. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.83, a PEG ratio of 1.14 and a beta of 1.47.

Avient (NYSE:AVNT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 6th. The company reported $0.76 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.72 by $0.04. Avient had a return on equity of 10.34% and a net margin of 3.70%. The company had revenue of $850.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $841.40 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.63 EPS. Avient’s quarterly revenue was up 3.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts expect that Avient Co. will post 2.65 earnings per share for the current year.

Avient Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 9th. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 13th will be given a dividend of $0.2575 per share. This is a positive change from Avient’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. The ex-dividend date is Friday, September 13th. This represents a $1.03 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.14%. Avient’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 89.57%.

About Avient

Avient Corporation operates as a formulator of material solutions in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Europe, South America, and Asia. It operates in two segments, Color, Additives and Inks; and Specialty Engineered Materials. The Color, Additives and Inks segment offers custom color and additive concentrates in solid and liquid form for thermoplastics, dispersions for thermosets, and specialty inks; custom-formulated liquid system, such as polyester, vinyl, natural rubber and latex, polyurethane, and silicone; and proprietary inks.