Valley National Bancorp (NASDAQ:VLY) Given Average Recommendation of “Hold” by Brokerages

Valley National Bancorp (NASDAQ:VLY) has been given a consensus recommendation of “Hold” by the eight analysts that are covering the company, Marketbeat reports. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and two have assigned a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1 year target price among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $10.00.

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on VLY. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of Valley National Bancorp from $9.50 to $10.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. StockNews.com cut shares of Valley National Bancorp from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 19th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Valley National Bancorp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price target for the company from $10.50 to $11.00 in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price target on shares of Valley National Bancorp from $10.00 to $11.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on Valley National Bancorp from $10.00 to $11.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 5th.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Valley National Bancorp

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of VLY. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its stake in shares of Valley National Bancorp by 1.3% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 25,722,816 shares of the company’s stock valued at $179,537,000 after buying an additional 337,416 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Valley National Bancorp by 2.8% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 11,164,934 shares of the company’s stock valued at $101,170,000 after purchasing an additional 300,385 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Valley National Bancorp by 193.2% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 10,173,791 shares of the company’s stock worth $69,233,000 after purchasing an additional 6,703,552 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its position in shares of Valley National Bancorp by 384.2% in the 3rd quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 8,970,862 shares of the company’s stock worth $81,276,000 after purchasing an additional 7,118,044 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Valley National Bancorp by 1.4% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 6,971,223 shares of the company’s stock valued at $63,159,000 after purchasing an additional 98,574 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 61.00% of the company’s stock.

Valley National Bancorp Stock Up 1.7 %

VLY stock opened at $9.16 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $9.94 and a 200-day moving average of $8.61. Valley National Bancorp has a fifty-two week low of $6.47 and a fifty-two week high of $11.18. The company has a market capitalization of $4.67 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.77 and a beta of 1.09. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.50, a quick ratio of 0.97 and a current ratio of 0.99.

Valley National Bancorp (NASDAQ:VLY) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The company reported $0.18 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.18. The company had revenue of $921.22 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $467.87 million. Valley National Bancorp had a net margin of 9.42% and a return on equity of 5.87%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.26 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Valley National Bancorp will post 0.65 earnings per share for the current year.

Valley National Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 2nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, December 13th will be paid a dividend of $0.11 per share. This represents a $0.44 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.80%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, December 13th. Valley National Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 70.97%.

About Valley National Bancorp

Valley National Bancorp operates as the holding company for Valley National Bank that provides various commercial, private banking, retail, insurance, and wealth management financial services products. It operates through Consumer Banking, Commercial Banking, and Treasury and Corporate other segments.