ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc. Reduces Position in NVIDIA Co. (NASDAQ:NVDA)

ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc. decreased its holdings in NVIDIA Co. (NASDAQ:NVDA) by 6.0% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 653,884 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock after selling 41,816 shares during the quarter. NVIDIA accounts for approximately 3.2% of ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 6th biggest holding. ZWJ Investment Counsel Inc.’s holdings in NVIDIA were worth $79,408,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Lowe Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in NVIDIA in the 2nd quarter valued at about $25,000. DHJJ Financial Advisors Ltd. increased its stake in NVIDIA by 1,900.0% in the 2nd quarter. DHJJ Financial Advisors Ltd. now owns 200 shares of the computer hardware maker’s stock valued at $25,000 after buying an additional 190 shares during the last quarter. FPC Investment Advisory Inc. purchased a new stake in NVIDIA in the 1st quarter valued at about $26,000. CGC Financial Services LLC purchased a new stake in shares of NVIDIA during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $26,000. Finally, Koesten Hirschmann & Crabtree INC. purchased a new stake in shares of NVIDIA during the 1st quarter worth approximately $27,000. Institutional investors own 65.27% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price target on shares of NVIDIA from $165.00 to $185.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Rosenblatt Securities restated a “buy” rating and set a $200.00 price target on shares of NVIDIA in a research note on Monday. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on shares of NVIDIA from $150.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Bank of America restated a “buy” rating and set a $190.00 price target on shares of NVIDIA in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Oppenheimer restated an “outperform” rating and set a $175.00 price target on shares of NVIDIA in a research note on Thursday. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty-nine have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, NVIDIA has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $160.82.

NVIDIA Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NVDA opened at $146.71 on Friday. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $133.55 and its 200 day moving average price is $121.72. NVIDIA Co. has a 1 year low of $45.01 and a 1 year high of $152.89. The company has a market capitalization of $3.60 trillion, a PE ratio of 68.81, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.66. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15, a quick ratio of 3.79 and a current ratio of 4.27.

NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 20th. The computer hardware maker reported $0.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.69 by $0.12. NVIDIA had a net margin of 55.04% and a return on equity of 113.50%. The firm had revenue of $35.08 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $33.15 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.38 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 93.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts predict that NVIDIA Co. will post 2.68 earnings per share for the current year.

NVIDIA Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 27th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 5th will be given a dividend of $0.01 per share. This represents a $0.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.03%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, December 5th. NVIDIA’s dividend payout ratio is presently 1.88%.

NVIDIA announced that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback plan on Wednesday, August 28th that allows the company to repurchase $50.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the computer hardware maker to repurchase up to 1.6% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are typically a sign that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other NVIDIA news, insider Donald F. Robertson, Jr. sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $116.51, for a total transaction of $524,295.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 492,409 shares in the company, valued at approximately $57,370,572.59. This represents a 0.91 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, Director Tench Coxe sold 1,000,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $119.27, for a total transaction of $119,270,000.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 5,852,480 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $698,025,289.60. This represents a 14.59 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 2,156,270 shares of company stock worth $254,784,327. Company insiders own 4.23% of the company’s stock.

About NVIDIA

NVIDIA Corporation provides graphics and compute and networking solutions in the United States, Taiwan, China, Hong Kong, and internationally. The Graphics segment offers GeForce GPUs for gaming and PCs, the GeForce NOW game streaming service and related infrastructure, and solutions for gaming platforms; Quadro/NVIDIA RTX GPUs for enterprise workstation graphics; virtual GPU or vGPU software for cloud-based visual and virtual computing; automotive platforms for infotainment systems; and Omniverse software for building and operating metaverse and 3D internet applications.