MQS Management LLC Invests $514,000 in Sealed Air Co. (NYSE:SEE)

MQS Management LLC purchased a new stake in Sealed Air Co. (NYSE:SEE) in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 14,783 shares of the industrial products company’s stock, valued at approximately $514,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Hsbc Holdings PLC grew its stake in Sealed Air by 2,549.6% during the 4th quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC now owns 5,340,247 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $195,720,000 after acquiring an additional 5,138,700 shares in the last quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. purchased a new position in Sealed Air during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $86,410,000. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Sealed Air during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $52,968,000. Appian Way Asset Management LP acquired a new position in Sealed Air in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $29,877,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in Sealed Air by 3.7% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 16,703,769 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $621,380,000 after buying an additional 600,146 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 94.40% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have recently weighed in on SEE. Stifel Nicolaus assumed coverage on shares of Sealed Air in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $47.00 price target on the stock. Jefferies Financial Group downgraded Sealed Air from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and cut their price target for the stock from $47.00 to $35.00 in a research note on Friday, August 9th. Truist Financial reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $44.00 price target on shares of Sealed Air in a research note on Monday, June 17th. Morgan Stanley began coverage on shares of Sealed Air in a research report on Wednesday, September 4th. They set an “equal weight” rating and a $39.00 price objective on the stock. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada downgraded shares of Sealed Air from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and decreased their target price for the stock from $43.00 to $40.00 in a research report on Friday, July 19th. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Sealed Air currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $41.30.

Sealed Air Price Performance

NYSE SEE opened at $35.60 on Friday. Sealed Air Co. has a 1 year low of $28.50 and a 1 year high of $41.14. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $34.87 and a 200 day simple moving average of $35.39. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 6.81. The company has a market cap of $5.19 billion, a P/E ratio of 14.30, a P/E/G ratio of 8.59 and a beta of 1.34.

Sealed Air (NYSE:SEE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 8th. The industrial products company reported $0.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.64 by $0.19. The business had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.31 billion. Sealed Air had a net margin of 6.64% and a return on equity of 85.65%. Sealed Air’s quarterly revenue was down 2.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.80 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Sealed Air Co. will post 2.93 EPS for the current year.

Sealed Air Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, September 27th. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 13th will be given a $0.20 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, September 13th. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.25%. Sealed Air’s dividend payout ratio is currently 32.13%.

About Sealed Air

Sealed Air Corporation provides packaging solutions in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Australia, and New Zealand. It operates through two segments, Food and Protective. The Food segment offers integrated packaging materials and automation equipment solutions to provide food safety, shelf life extension, reduce food waste, automate processes, and optimize total cost for food processors in the fresh red meat, smoked and processed meats, poultry, seafood, plant-based, fluids and liquids and cheese markets under the CRYOVAC, CRYOVAC Grip & Tear, CRYOVAC Darfresh, LIQUIBOX, Simple Steps, and Optidure brands.