HNI (NYSE:HNI) Stock Price Crosses Above 200 Day Moving Average – Should You Sell?

HNI Corporation (NYSE:HNI)’s share price passed above its two hundred day moving average during trading on Tuesday . The stock has a two hundred day moving average of $39.47 and traded as high as $42.24. HNI shares last traded at $40.3030, with a volume of 630,826 shares trading hands.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have commented on the company. Benchmark reduced their target price on HNI from $75.00 to $65.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, May 7th. Weiss Ratings downgraded HNI from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a report on Thursday, May 21st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $65.00.

HNI Price Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a quick ratio of 0.86 and a current ratio of 1.39. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $34.09 and its 200 day moving average price is $39.47. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 98.30, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.52 and a beta of 0.90.

HNI (NYSE:HNI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 6th. The business services provider reported $0.34 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.31 by $0.03. HNI had a net margin of 0.04% and a return on equity of 13.17%. The firm had revenue of $1.35 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.37 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $0.44 earnings per share. HNI’s quarterly revenue was up 124.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that HNI Corporation will post 4 earnings per share for the current year.

HNI Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 10th. Investors of record on Friday, May 29th were given a dividend of $0.35 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, May 29th. This represents a $1.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.5%. This is an increase from HNI’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.34. HNI’s payout ratio is presently 341.46%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On HNI

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in HNI. Millennium Management LLC acquired a new position in shares of HNI during the first quarter valued at $10,666,000. Jane Street Group LLC acquired a new stake in shares of HNI in the 1st quarter worth about $10,301,000. Cooke & Bieler LP increased its holdings in shares of HNI by 23.0% in the 4th quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP now owns 754,493 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $31,719,000 after acquiring an additional 140,971 shares during the period. SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its position in HNI by 167.4% in the 4th quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 42,621 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $1,792,000 after purchasing an additional 26,683 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Entropy Technologies LP bought a new stake in HNI in the 3rd quarter valued at about $676,000. 75.26% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About HNI

HNI Corporation, founded in 1944 as the Heating & Novelty Company and headquartered in Muscatine, Iowa, is a leading manufacturer of office furniture and hearth products. Over its history, the company has evolved from producing gas heaters into two primary business segments: Office Furniture and Hearth & Home. HNI’s Office Furniture division operates under well-known brands such as The HON Company, Allsteel, Gunlocke and Kimball, offering a comprehensive portfolio of workstations, seating, tables, storage solutions and acoustic products tailored for corporate, education, healthcare and government markets.

In its Hearth & Home segment, HNI designs, manufactures and distributes fireplaces, stoves, fireplace inserts, logs and related accessories.