Adobe Inc. (NASDAQ:ADBE) Shares Sold by Principal Financial Group Inc.

Principal Financial Group Inc. decreased its stake in shares of Adobe Inc. (NASDAQ:ADBE) by 62.4% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 689,747 shares of the software company’s stock after selling 1,143,436 shares during the quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. owned about 0.16% of Adobe worth $306,717,000 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 the stock. Legacy Investment Solutions LLC purchased a new position in Adobe in the 3rd quarter worth $26,000. Groupama Asset Managment increased its holdings in shares of Adobe by 28.8% in the third quarter. Groupama Asset Managment now owns 51,482 shares of the software company’s stock valued at $27,000 after purchasing an additional 11,522 shares during the period. MidAtlantic Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Adobe in the third quarter worth about $30,000. True Wealth Design LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Adobe by 141.7% during the third quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 58 shares of the software company’s stock worth $30,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the period. Finally, Decker Retirement Planning Inc. purchased a new stake in Adobe in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $31,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 81.79% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Amy Banse sold 606 shares of Adobe stock in a transaction on Friday, December 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $550.00, for a total transaction of $333,300.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 32,929 shares in the company, valued at $18,110,950. The trade was a 1.81 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, EVP Scott Belsky sold 3,819 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $430.24, for a total transaction of $1,643,086.56. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 18,334 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,888,020.16. This represents a 17.24 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 5,681 shares of company stock valued at $2,525,126 in the last ninety days. 0.15% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on ADBE shares. StockNews.com raised shares of Adobe from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. BNP Paribas raised shares of Adobe from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $425.00 target price for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 15th. Stifel Nicolaus lowered their price target on shares of Adobe from $650.00 to $600.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 12th. JMP Securities reaffirmed a “market perform” rating on shares of Adobe in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on Adobe from $525.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Friday, January 3rd. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating, sixteen have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $573.00.

Adobe Stock Up 0.2 %

Shares of ADBE opened at $460.16 on Tuesday. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $446.56 and a 200 day moving average price of $496.20. Adobe Inc. has a one year low of $403.75 and a one year high of $607.32. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.29, a quick ratio of 1.07 and a current ratio of 1.07. The stock has a market capitalization of $200.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 37.11, a PEG ratio of 2.11 and a beta of 1.31.

Adobe (NASDAQ:ADBE) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, December 11th. The software company reported $4.81 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.67 by $0.14. The business had revenue of $5.61 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.54 billion. Adobe had a net margin of 25.85% and a return on equity of 45.87%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 11.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $3.52 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that Adobe Inc. will post 16.65 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About Adobe

Adobe Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified software company worldwide. It operates through three segments: Digital Media, Digital Experience, and Publishing and Advertising. The Digital Media segment offers products, services, and solutions that enable individuals, teams, and enterprises to create, publish, and promote content; and Document Cloud, a unified cloud-based document services platform.