Flowers Foods, Inc. (NYSE:FLO) Shares Acquired by Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC

Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC boosted its holdings in Flowers Foods, Inc. (NYSE:FLO) by 16.3% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 54,847 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 7,671 shares during the quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC’s holdings in Flowers Foods were worth $1,217,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of FLO. Cooke & Bieler LP raised its position in shares of Flowers Foods by 73.1% during the second quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP now owns 5,301,518 shares of the company’s stock worth $117,694,000 after purchasing an additional 2,239,592 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Flowers Foods in the 4th quarter worth about $26,016,000. Verition Fund Management LLC raised its holdings in Flowers Foods by 293.7% during the 4th quarter. Verition Fund Management LLC now owns 782,518 shares of the company’s stock worth $17,614,000 after buying an additional 583,749 shares during the period. Lighthouse Investment Partners LLC acquired a new position in shares of Flowers Foods in the fourth quarter worth about $5,751,000. Finally, Renaissance Technologies LLC increased its position in shares of Flowers Foods by 4.3% in the second quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 5,851,682 shares of the company’s stock worth $129,907,000 after acquiring an additional 242,797 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.45% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research firms recently commented on FLO. BNP Paribas began coverage on shares of Flowers Foods in a research note on Wednesday, July 10th. They issued an “underperform” rating and a $20.00 price objective for the company. StockNews.com lowered Flowers Foods from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $22.75.

Flowers Foods Trading Down 1.4 %

Flowers Foods stock opened at $23.44 on Monday. Flowers Foods, Inc. has a 12 month low of $19.64 and a 12 month high of $26.12. The company has a quick ratio of 0.91, a current ratio of 1.19 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.77. The stock has a market cap of $4.95 billion, a P/E ratio of 39.73, a P/E/G ratio of 4.36 and a beta of 0.36. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $22.83 and its 200-day simple moving average is $23.17.

Flowers Foods (NYSE:FLO) last issued its earnings results on Friday, August 16th. The company reported $0.36 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.33 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $1.23 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.24 billion. Flowers Foods had a return on equity of 18.97% and a net margin of 2.51%. The business’s revenue was down .3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.33 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Flowers Foods, Inc. will post 1.26 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Flowers Foods Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 20th. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 6th were given a dividend of $0.24 per share. This represents a $0.96 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.10%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 6th. Flowers Foods’s payout ratio is 162.71%.

Flowers Foods Company Profile

Flowers Foods, Inc produces and markets packaged bakery food products in the United States. Its principal products include fresh breads, buns, rolls, snack items, bagels, English muffins, and tortillas, as well as frozen breads and rolls under the Nature's Own, Dave's Killer Bread, Wonder, Canyon Bakehouse, Mrs.