Ruth Porat Acquires 219 Shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) Stock

Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) Director Ruth Porat acquired 219 shares of Blackstone stock in a transaction on Monday, May 6th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $119.48 per share, with a total value of $26,166.12. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now owns 34,445 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,115,488.60. The acquisition was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link.

Ruth Porat also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, February 12th, Ruth Porat purchased 232 shares of Blackstone stock. The stock was bought at an average cost of $127.08 per share, with a total value of $29,482.56.

Blackstone Stock Down 1.4 %

Shares of BX stock traded down $1.71 during midday trading on Wednesday, reaching $119.79. 2,918,918 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 3,674,363. Blackstone Inc. has a 1 year low of $80.05 and a 1 year high of $133.56. The company’s 50 day moving average is $124.96 and its two-hundred day moving average is $119.45. The company has a current ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61. The firm has a market cap of $85.61 billion, a PE ratio of 42.33, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.98 and a beta of 1.52.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, April 18th. The asset manager reported $0.98 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.98. The firm had revenue of $3.69 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.56 billion. Blackstone had a return on equity of 17.33% and a net margin of 20.84%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 166.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $0.97 EPS. On average, equities research analysts predict that Blackstone Inc. will post 4.77 EPS for the current year.

Blackstone Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, May 6th. Investors of record on Monday, April 29th were given a $0.83 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, April 26th. This represents a $3.32 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.77%. Blackstone’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 117.31%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Blackstone

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in BX. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 1.4% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 62,972,648 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $8,244,379,000 after buying an additional 880,745 shares during the period. Capital World Investors lifted its holdings in shares of Blackstone by 4.2% during the 4th quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 33,738,986 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $4,417,140,000 after buying an additional 1,367,581 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its holdings in Blackstone by 13.3% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 14,825,769 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,588,433,000 after purchasing an additional 1,744,652 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp raised its holdings in Blackstone by 43.9% in the 3rd quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 6,877,288 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $736,833,000 after purchasing an additional 2,098,150 shares during the period. Finally, Brown Advisory Inc. increased its stake in Blackstone by 5.3% in the 4th quarter. Brown Advisory Inc. now owns 6,429,749 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $841,783,000 after buying an additional 322,860 shares in the last quarter. 70.00% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on BX shares. UBS Group lifted their price objective on Blackstone from $135.00 to $138.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, April 12th. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on Blackstone from $144.00 to $145.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 17th. TheStreet lowered Blackstone from a “b” rating to a “c+” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 25th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price target on Blackstone from $105.00 to $100.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 19th. Finally, TD Cowen dropped their price target on Blackstone from $117.00 to $114.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, April 19th. Thirteen research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Blackstone currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $123.65.

About Blackstone

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.