American Century Companies Inc. Grows Stock Holdings in STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM)

American Century Companies Inc. raised its stake in STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM) by 6.5% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 469,669 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock after buying an additional 28,846 shares during the period. American Century Companies Inc. owned approximately 0.05% of STMicroelectronics worth $18,449,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of STM. Van ECK Associates Corp grew its holdings in shares of STMicroelectronics by 11.6% in the 2nd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 6,476,264 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock worth $254,388,000 after acquiring an additional 675,353 shares during the period. Capital International Investors grew its holdings in STMicroelectronics by 2.4% in the first quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 3,132,920 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock valued at $135,467,000 after purchasing an additional 74,519 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. increased its position in shares of STMicroelectronics by 5.4% in the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 2,369,273 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock valued at $118,772,000 after buying an additional 120,399 shares in the last quarter. Rafferty Asset Management LLC raised its stake in shares of STMicroelectronics by 8.7% during the 4th quarter. Rafferty Asset Management LLC now owns 1,615,616 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock worth $80,991,000 after buying an additional 129,772 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. raised its stake in shares of STMicroelectronics by 0.5% during the 2nd quarter. BNP PARIBAS ASSET MANAGEMENT Holding S.A. now owns 1,564,232 shares of the semiconductor producer’s stock worth $61,443,000 after buying an additional 7,732 shares during the last quarter. 5.05% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently commented on STM. StockNews.com cut shares of STMicroelectronics from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday. The Goldman Sachs Group raised shares of STMicroelectronics from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $35.50 to $45.80 in a research note on Tuesday, June 18th. Sanford C. Bernstein reduced their target price on STMicroelectronics from $54.00 to $41.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, July 30th. Morgan Stanley downgraded STMicroelectronics from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, July 26th. Finally, TD Cowen cut their price target on STMicroelectronics from $50.00 to $40.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday, July 26th. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $43.13.

STMicroelectronics Price Performance

STM stock opened at $27.94 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.24 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.16, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.35 and a beta of 1.58. The company has a quick ratio of 2.56, a current ratio of 3.35 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17. STMicroelectronics has a 52-week low of $27.44 and a 52-week high of $51.27. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $32.26 and its 200-day simple moving average is $38.84.

STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 25th. The semiconductor producer reported $0.38 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.34 by $0.04. STMicroelectronics had a return on equity of 18.18% and a net margin of 19.68%. The firm had revenue of $3.23 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.55 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.06 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 25.3% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that STMicroelectronics will post 1.66 EPS for the current year.

STMicroelectronics Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 27th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, December 17th will be paid a dividend of $0.09 per share. This represents a $0.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.29%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, December 17th. STMicroelectronics’s dividend payout ratio is currently 7.69%.

STMicroelectronics Profile

STMicroelectronics N.V., together with its subsidiaries, designs, develops, manufactures, and sells semiconductor products in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Americas, and the Asia Pacific. The company operates through Automotive and Discrete Group; Analog, MEMS and Sensors Group; and Microcontrollers and Digital ICs Group segments.