Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) Director Sells $17,561,522.88 in Stock

Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) Director Joseph Baratta sold 116,448 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $150.81, for a total value of $17,561,522.88. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 799,749 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $120,610,146.69. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website.

Blackstone Stock Performance

Shares of Blackstone stock traded down $1.01 on Thursday, hitting $151.20. 2,108,818 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 3,456,484. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.60, a quick ratio of 0.77 and a current ratio of 0.77. Blackstone Inc. has a 1 year low of $88.59 and a 1 year high of $161.25. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $142.21 and a 200-day simple moving average of $131.01. The stock has a market capitalization of $108.05 billion, a PE ratio of 53.26, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.51.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 18th. The asset manager reported $0.96 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.99 by ($0.03). Blackstone had a net margin of 19.35% and a return on equity of 17.43%. The firm had revenue of $3.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.58 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.93 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 166.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.57 EPS for the current year.

Blackstone Cuts Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 5th. Shareholders of record on Monday, July 29th were issued a $0.82 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, July 29th. This represents a $3.28 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.17%. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio is currently 115.90%.

Institutional Trading of Blackstone

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of BX. Wulff Hansen & CO. increased its holdings in Blackstone by 12,192.7% in the 2nd quarter. Wulff Hansen & CO. now owns 7,340,845 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $908,797,000 after acquiring an additional 7,281,128 shares during the last quarter. Capital World Investors increased its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 7.5% in the 1st quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 36,285,872 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $4,766,875,000 after buying an additional 2,546,886 shares during the last quarter. Lone Pine Capital LLC bought a new stake in shares of Blackstone in the 4th quarter worth about $290,514,000. Lazard Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 19,048.1% in the 1st quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC now owns 1,883,409 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $247,423,000 after buying an additional 1,873,573 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 2.0% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 64,262,972 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $8,442,227,000 after buying an additional 1,290,324 shares during the last quarter. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

BX has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. TD Cowen boosted their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $114.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, July 19th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on shares of Blackstone from $134.00 to $149.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, July 19th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft increased their price target on shares of Blackstone from $145.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 15th. Redburn Atlantic started coverage on shares of Blackstone in a research note on Tuesday, August 27th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $134.00 price target for the company. Finally, Bank of America increased their price target on shares of Blackstone from $130.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 19th. Fourteen analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Blackstone currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $131.17.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.