Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) Receives Average Rating of “Reduce” from Analysts

Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) has earned an average recommendation of “Reduce” from the seventeen ratings firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell recommendation, nine have given a hold recommendation and three have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 12-month price target among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $120.59.

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. UBS Group lowered shares of Celanese from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price objective for the stock from $161.00 to $97.00 in a research note on Monday, November 11th. KeyCorp downgraded Celanese from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Monday, October 7th. BMO Capital Markets lowered Celanese from a “market perform” rating to an “underperform” rating and dropped their target price for the stock from $138.00 to $76.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Robert W. Baird lowered their price target on shares of Celanese from $150.00 to $110.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, November 6th. Finally, Vertical Research lowered shares of Celanese from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $130.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Celanese

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of CE. Covestor Ltd boosted its stake in Celanese by 45.1% in the 1st quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 689 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $118,000 after purchasing an additional 214 shares during the period. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC boosted its position in Celanese by 13.4% in the first quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC now owns 14,608 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $2,511,000 after buying an additional 1,731 shares in the last quarter. UniSuper Management Pty Ltd increased its holdings in Celanese by 464.6% during the 1st quarter. UniSuper Management Pty Ltd now owns 7,170 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,232,000 after purchasing an additional 5,900 shares in the last quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. lifted its position in Celanese by 264.2% during the 1st quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 19,441 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $3,342,000 after buying an additional 14,103 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Lake Street Advisors Group LLC bought a new position in Celanese in the 1st quarter worth approximately $380,000. 98.87% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Celanese Stock Performance

Shares of CE stock opened at $72.19 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 1.37 and a quick ratio of 0.76. Celanese has a 12 month low of $71.45 and a 12 month high of $172.16. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $119.54 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $132.41. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.89 billion, a P/E ratio of 7.26, a P/E/G ratio of 0.76 and a beta of 1.31.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 4th. The basic materials company reported $2.44 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.85 by ($0.41). The firm had revenue of $2.65 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.70 billion. Celanese had a net margin of 10.40% and a return on equity of 13.17%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 2.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $2.50 earnings per share. On average, research analysts anticipate that Celanese will post 8.67 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, November 13th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, October 30th were given a $0.70 dividend. This represents a $2.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.88%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, October 30th. Celanese’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 28.17%.

About Celanese

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.