First Merchants Corp Acquires 3,945 Shares of SAP SE $SAP

First Merchants Corp lifted its holdings in shares of SAP SE (NYSE:SAP) by 34.3% during the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 15,450 shares of the software maker’s stock after buying an additional 3,945 shares during the period. First Merchants Corp’s holdings in SAP were worth $2,645,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of SAP. SG Americas Securities LLC increased its position in SAP by 1,374.1% during the first quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 57,299 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $9,810,000 after buying an additional 53,412 shares during the last quarter. Baron Wealth Management LLC raised its holdings in SAP by 3.9% during the first quarter. Baron Wealth Management LLC now owns 1,707 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $292,000 after buying an additional 64 shares in the last quarter. Rockefeller Capital Management L.P. lifted its position in shares of SAP by 17.5% in the fourth quarter. Rockefeller Capital Management L.P. now owns 22,171 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $5,386,000 after buying an additional 3,308 shares during the last quarter. Bayban bought a new stake in shares of SAP during the 4th quarter worth about $28,000. Finally, Pure Financial Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of SAP by 24.2% during the 4th quarter. Pure Financial Advisors LLC now owns 3,253 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $790,000 after acquiring an additional 634 shares in the last quarter.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the company. Zacks Research downgraded SAP from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, March 5th. Weiss Ratings cut SAP from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c-)” rating in a research report on Thursday, June 11th. Piper Sandler downgraded SAP from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 14th. The Goldman Sachs Group reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $265.00 price target on shares of SAP in a research report on Wednesday, June 10th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. reaffirmed a “neutral” rating on shares of SAP in a report on Tuesday, March 24th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twelve have given a Buy rating and seven have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $283.40.

SAP Price Performance

NYSE SAP opened at $155.38 on Monday. SAP SE has a twelve month low of $154.13 and a twelve month high of $313.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.11, a quick ratio of 1.07 and a current ratio of 1.07. The stock has a market capitalization of $190.89 billion, a PE ratio of 21.00, a P/E/G ratio of 1.74 and a beta of 1.12. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $172.90 and a 200 day simple moving average of $199.48.

SAP (NYSE:SAP) last announced its earnings results on Friday, February 27th. The software maker reported $1.99 earnings per share for the quarter. The firm had revenue of $11.06 billion during the quarter. SAP had a return on equity of 17.31% and a net margin of 20.08%. Research analysts anticipate that SAP SE will post 8.37 EPS for the current year.

SAP Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed an annual dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 15th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, May 5th were given a $2.9291 dividend. This is a positive change from SAP’s previous annual dividend of $2.54. This represents a dividend yield of 170.0%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, May 5th. SAP’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 28.92%.

About SAP

SAP SE is a global enterprise software company headquartered in Walldorf, Germany. Founded in 1972 by five former IBM engineers, the company’s name is an acronym for Systeme, Anwendungen und Produkte in der Datenverarbeitung (Systems, Applications & Products in Data Processing). SAP develops and sells software and services that help organizations manage business processes across finance, human resources, procurement, manufacturing, supply chain and customer relationships.

SAP’s product portfolio spans on‑premises and cloud offerings, anchored by its enterprise resource planning (ERP) solutions such as SAP S/4HANA and the SAP HANA in‑memory database and platform.