Principal Financial Group Inc. Decreases Position in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC)

Principal Financial Group Inc. trimmed its holdings in shares of The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC) by 2.4% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 243,179 shares of the company’s stock after selling 5,942 shares during the quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. owned 0.24% of Toro worth $19,479,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in TTC. Blue Trust Inc. boosted its stake in Toro by 534.8% in the 3rd quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,333 shares of the company’s stock worth $125,000 after purchasing an additional 1,123 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its holdings in shares of Toro by 13.1% during the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 6,251 shares of the company’s stock valued at $542,000 after buying an additional 723 shares during the last quarter. Forsta AP Fonden raised its stake in Toro by 9.0% in the 3rd quarter. Forsta AP Fonden now owns 23,100 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,003,000 after acquiring an additional 1,900 shares during the last quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue lifted its position in Toro by 4.6% during the 3rd quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue now owns 18,646 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,616,000 after acquiring an additional 815 shares during the period. Finally, Klein Pavlis & Peasley Financial Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Toro by 6.9% in the third quarter. Klein Pavlis & Peasley Financial Inc. now owns 7,879 shares of the company’s stock valued at $683,000 after purchasing an additional 507 shares during the period. 87.95% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Toro Trading Down 0.1 %

Shares of NYSE:TTC opened at $79.89 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.81, a quick ratio of 0.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59. The Toro Company has a 12-month low of $76.95 and a 12-month high of $100.93. The business has a 50 day moving average of $81.61 and a two-hundred day moving average of $84.20. The company has a market capitalization of $8.04 billion, a PE ratio of 19.92 and a beta of 0.72.

Toro (NYSE:TTC) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $0.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.95. The firm had revenue of $1.08 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.09 billion. Toro had a net margin of 9.14% and a return on equity of 27.25%. The business’s revenue was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.71 EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that The Toro Company will post 4.41 EPS for the current year.

Toro declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase program on Tuesday, December 10th that allows the company to buyback 4,000,000 outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are typically a sign that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Toro Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, January 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 23rd were given a dividend of $0.38 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 23rd. This is a boost from Toro’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.36. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.90%. Toro’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 37.91%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on TTC shares. Raymond James dropped their target price on Toro from $100.00 to $95.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Northland Securities upgraded shares of Toro from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $100.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Monday. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $93.75.

About Toro

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.