Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) Price Target Raised to $135.00 at Citigroup

Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) had its price target hoisted by Citigroup from $125.00 to $135.00 in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday morning, Benzinga reports. Citigroup currently has a neutral rating on the specialty chemicals company’s stock.

ALB has been the topic of several other reports. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lowered shares of Albemarle from a buy rating to a hold rating and cut their target price for the stock from $155.00 to $135.00 in a report on Thursday, January 11th. Mizuho dropped their price objective on shares of Albemarle from $115.00 to $112.00 and set a neutral rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, March 7th. UBS Group dropped their price objective on shares of Albemarle from $137.00 to $125.00 and set a neutral rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 15th. KeyCorp dropped their price objective on shares of Albemarle from $178.00 to $159.00 and set an overweight rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, March 7th. Finally, TD Cowen lowered shares of Albemarle from an outperform rating to a market perform rating and dropped their price objective for the stock from $220.00 to $130.00 in a report on Monday, January 29th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Albemarle presently has a consensus rating of Hold and a consensus price target of $177.80.

Albemarle Trading Down 1.1 %

ALB opened at $127.70 on Wednesday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $122.49 and its two-hundred day moving average is $131.58. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.37, a quick ratio of 0.86 and a current ratio of 1.47. The firm has a market cap of $15.01 billion, a PE ratio of 9.57, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.61 and a beta of 1.62. Albemarle has a twelve month low of $106.69 and a twelve month high of $247.44.

Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 15th. The specialty chemicals company reported $1.85 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.99 by $0.86. The company had revenue of $2.36 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.18 billion. Albemarle had a net margin of 16.36% and a return on equity of 26.62%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 10.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business posted $8.62 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that Albemarle will post 3.15 EPS for the current year.

Albemarle Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, April 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 15th were given a $0.40 dividend. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.25%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 14th. Albemarle’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 11.99%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Ridgewood Investments LLC grew its position in shares of Albemarle by 49.1% in the 1st quarter. Ridgewood Investments LLC now owns 4,256 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $561,000 after acquiring an additional 1,402 shares during the period. Banque Cantonale Vaudoise grew its position in shares of Albemarle by 28.7% in the 1st quarter. Banque Cantonale Vaudoise now owns 10,500 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock valued at $1,384,000 after acquiring an additional 2,342 shares during the period. Czech National Bank boosted its holdings in shares of Albemarle by 0.5% during the 1st quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 20,648 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $2,720,000 after buying an additional 95 shares during the period. Perpetual Ltd boosted its holdings in shares of Albemarle by 2.9% during the 1st quarter. Perpetual Ltd now owns 117,977 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $15,542,000 after buying an additional 3,295 shares during the period. Finally, Alaska Permanent Fund Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Albemarle by 113.9% during the 1st quarter. Alaska Permanent Fund Corp now owns 6,405 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $844,000 after buying an additional 3,410 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.87% of the company’s stock.

About Albemarle

Albemarle Corporation develops, manufactures, and markets engineered specialty chemicals worldwide. It operates through three segments: Energy Storage, Specialties and Ketjen. The Energy Storage segment offers lithium compounds, including lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide, and lithium chloride; technical services for the handling and use of reactive lithium products; and lithium-containing by-products recycling services.