MQS Management LLC Has $625,000 Stock Holdings in RLJ Lodging Trust (NYSE:RLJ)

MQS Management LLC lowered its stake in shares of RLJ Lodging Trust (NYSE:RLJ) by 25.7% in the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The fund owned 64,870 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after selling 22,391 shares during the period. MQS Management LLC’s holdings in RLJ Lodging Trust were worth $625,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of RLJ. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of RLJ Lodging Trust by 1.7% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 25,236,820 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $298,299,000 after purchasing an additional 420,428 shares during the last quarter. Donald Smith & CO. Inc. lifted its stake in shares of RLJ Lodging Trust by 131.1% during the 2nd quarter. Donald Smith & CO. Inc. now owns 3,311,274 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $31,888,000 after buying an additional 1,878,616 shares during the last quarter. LSV Asset Management boosted its stake in RLJ Lodging Trust by 9.8% in the 2nd quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 1,699,595 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $16,367,000 after purchasing an additional 152,395 shares during the period. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. grew its position in shares of RLJ Lodging Trust by 2.4% during the 2nd quarter. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. now owns 1,591,525 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $15,326,000 after purchasing an additional 37,137 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Clearbridge Investments LLC lifted its holdings in shares of RLJ Lodging Trust by 2.1% during the 1st quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 1,343,923 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $15,885,000 after acquiring an additional 27,746 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.35% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

RLJ has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Bank of America decreased their price objective on RLJ Lodging Trust from $12.00 to $10.00 and set an “underperform” rating for the company in a report on Monday, July 22nd. Robert W. Baird lowered their price target on shares of RLJ Lodging Trust from $13.00 to $12.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, June 11th. Compass Point lowered RLJ Lodging Trust from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their price objective for the company from $18.00 to $10.00 in a research note on Monday, August 5th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of RLJ Lodging Trust from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, August 30th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company downgraded shares of RLJ Lodging Trust from an “equal weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and lowered their price target for the stock from $11.00 to $9.00 in a research note on Friday, September 13th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $12.25.

RLJ Lodging Trust Price Performance

Shares of RLJ opened at $9.30 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 2.60 and a current ratio of 2.60. The business’s 50-day moving average is $9.32 and its two-hundred day moving average is $10.22. RLJ Lodging Trust has a fifty-two week low of $8.79 and a fifty-two week high of $12.39. The company has a market capitalization of $1.45 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.20, a P/E/G ratio of 0.85 and a beta of 1.70.

RLJ Lodging Trust (NYSE:RLJ) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The real estate investment trust reported $0.20 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.45 by ($0.25). RLJ Lodging Trust had a net margin of 4.93% and a return on equity of 3.34%. The firm had revenue of $369.30 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $365.67 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.56 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 3.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts predict that RLJ Lodging Trust will post 1.34 earnings per share for the current year.

RLJ Lodging Trust Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, October 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, September 30th will be issued a dividend of $0.15 per share. This is a positive change from RLJ Lodging Trust’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.10. The ex-dividend date is Monday, September 30th. This represents a $0.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 6.46%. RLJ Lodging Trust’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 214.29%.

RLJ Lodging Trust Company Profile

RLJ Lodging Trust is a self-advised, publicly traded real estate investment trust that owns primarily premium-branded, high-margin, focused-service and compact full-service hotels. The Company's portfolio currently consists of 96 hotels with approximately 21,200 rooms, located in 23 states and the District of Columbia and an ownership interest in one unconsolidated hotel with 171 rooms.