Ensign Peak Advisors Inc Sells 52,711 Shares of Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL)

Ensign Peak Advisors Inc cut its position in shares of Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) by 5.3% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 940,963 shares of the company’s stock after selling 52,711 shares during the quarter. Ensign Peak Advisors Inc owned 0.30% of Ball worth $56,477,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Independence Bank of Kentucky bought a new stake in Ball during the 1st quarter worth about $47,000. Friedenthal Financial acquired a new position in Ball during the second quarter valued at approximately $47,000. Ashton Thomas Private Wealth LLC bought a new position in Ball in the second quarter valued at approximately $72,000. Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators increased its position in shares of Ball by 17.0% during the 2nd quarter. Deseret Mutual Benefit Administrators now owns 1,280 shares of the company’s stock worth $77,000 after purchasing an additional 186 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Homestead Advisers Corp increased its position in shares of Ball by 46.7% during the 4th quarter. Homestead Advisers Corp now owns 1,577 shares of the company’s stock worth $91,000 after purchasing an additional 502 shares during the last quarter. 86.51% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

BALL has been the subject of several analyst reports. Truist Financial reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $78.00 target price (up from $76.00) on shares of Ball in a research note on Friday, August 2nd. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price objective on shares of Ball from $80.00 to $77.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, August 5th. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Ball from $56.00 to $59.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 6th. Citigroup reduced their price target on Ball from $73.00 to $66.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, July 8th. Finally, Baird R W upgraded Ball from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 14th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating, six have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Ball has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $70.83.

Ball Stock Down 1.2 %

BALL opened at $66.31 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.88 and a current ratio of 1.18. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $63.70 and a 200-day moving average of $65.14. Ball Co. has a fifty-two week low of $42.81 and a fifty-two week high of $71.32. The company has a market capitalization of $20.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 4.99, a P/E/G ratio of 1.64 and a beta of 0.88.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The company reported $0.74 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.70 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $2.96 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.10 billion. Ball had a net margin of 32.79% and a return on equity of 19.45%. The business’s revenue was down 3.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.61 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Ball Co. will post 3.12 EPS for the current year.

Ball Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 17th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 3rd were given a dividend of $0.20 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, September 3rd. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.21%. Ball’s payout ratio is 6.02%.

Ball Profile

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.