First Busey Co. (NASDAQ:BUSE) Shares Sold by State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D

State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D decreased its stake in shares of First Busey Co. (NASDAQ:BUSE) by 10.6% during the third quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 90,185 shares of the bank’s stock after selling 10,707 shares during the quarter. State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund D’s holdings in First Busey were worth $2,347,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in BUSE. Janus Henderson Group PLC increased its position in shares of First Busey by 22.5% in the 1st quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 1,159,907 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $27,895,000 after acquiring an additional 212,782 shares during the period. American Century Companies Inc. grew its stake in First Busey by 20.8% during the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 947,406 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $22,937,000 after purchasing an additional 163,042 shares during the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC increased its holdings in shares of First Busey by 28.9% in the second quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 386,231 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $9,351,000 after purchasing an additional 86,492 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its stake in shares of First Busey by 211.9% in the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 100,952 shares of the bank’s stock worth $2,627,000 after purchasing an additional 68,585 shares during the last quarter. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of First Busey during the third quarter worth about $540,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 56.49% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have issued reports on BUSE. DA Davidson raised their price target on shares of First Busey from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 28th. StockNews.com raised shares of First Busey from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, September 12th. Stephens downgraded First Busey from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and cut their price target for the stock from $28.00 to $27.00 in a research report on Monday, October 14th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price objective on First Busey from $31.00 to $33.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, August 28th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, First Busey has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $27.80.

First Busey Stock Down 1.2 %

BUSE stock opened at $26.83 on Thursday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $25.62 and its 200 day moving average is $24.89. The firm has a market cap of $1.53 billion, a PE ratio of 13.83 and a beta of 0.84. First Busey Co. has a one year low of $20.67 and a one year high of $28.97. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 0.82.

First Busey (NASDAQ:BUSE) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 22nd. The bank reported $0.58 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.54 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $170.45 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $118.32 million. First Busey had a return on equity of 8.94% and a net margin of 16.94%. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.55 EPS. On average, research analysts forecast that First Busey Co. will post 2.07 EPS for the current year.

First Busey Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, October 25th. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 18th were paid a dividend of $0.24 per share. This represents a $0.96 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.58%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 18th. First Busey’s payout ratio is 49.48%.

First Busey Company Profile

First Busey Corporation operates as the bank holding company for Busey Bank that engages in the provision of retail and commercial banking products and services to individual, corporate, institutional, and governmental customers in the United States. It operates through three segments: Banking, Wealth Management, and FirsTech.