Ellsworth Advisors LLC Makes New $471,000 Investment in Hawkins, Inc. (NASDAQ:HWKN)

Ellsworth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of Hawkins, Inc. (NASDAQ:HWKN) in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 6,694 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock, valued at approximately $471,000.

A number of other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in HWKN. Centerpoint Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Hawkins in the third quarter valued at approximately $29,000. Captrust Financial Advisors increased its stake in shares of Hawkins by 66.6% in the first quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 1,566 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $72,000 after buying an additional 626 shares during the period. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC increased its stake in shares of Hawkins by 17.2% in the third quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 2,520 shares of the specialty chemicals company’s stock worth $98,000 after buying an additional 369 shares during the period. Panagora Asset Management Inc. bought a new stake in Hawkins in the third quarter valued at $203,000. Finally, Gotham Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in Hawkins in the third quarter valued at $213,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 69.71% of the company’s stock.

Hawkins Stock Performance

Shares of HWKN stock traded down $0.25 during mid-day trading on Thursday, reaching $76.80. 135,068 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 146,755. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28, a quick ratio of 1.58 and a current ratio of 2.45. Hawkins, Inc. has a 12 month low of $39.20 and a 12 month high of $77.90. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $68.89 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $64.70. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.61 billion, a PE ratio of 22.07 and a beta of 0.74.

Hawkins (NASDAQ:HWKN) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, January 31st. The specialty chemicals company reported $0.71 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.61 by $0.10. Hawkins had a net margin of 7.91% and a return on equity of 19.54%. The company had revenue of $208.50 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $221.24 million. On average, research analysts forecast that Hawkins, Inc. will post 3.61 EPS for the current year.

Hawkins Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 16th were given a dividend of $0.16 per share. This represents a $0.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.83%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, February 15th. Hawkins’s dividend payout ratio is 18.39%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, StockNews.com cut shares of Hawkins from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 9th.

About Hawkins

Hawkins, Inc operates as a specialty chemical and ingredients company in the United States. It operates through three segments: Industrial, Water Treatment, and Health and Nutrition. The Industrial segment offers industrial chemicals, products, and services to agriculture, chemical processing, electronics, energy, food, pharmaceutical, and plating industries.