Laffer Tengler Investments Inc. Boosts Holdings in Southern Copper Co. (NYSE:SCCO)

Laffer Tengler Investments Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Southern Copper Co. (NYSE:SCCO) by 13.2% during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 4,255 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 496 shares during the period. Laffer Tengler Investments Inc.’s holdings in Southern Copper were worth $388,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its position in shares of Southern Copper by 74.6% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 1,402,983 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $162,283,000 after acquiring an additional 599,610 shares during the period. Itau Unibanco Holding S.A. grew its stake in Southern Copper by 115,910.7% during the 3rd quarter. Itau Unibanco Holding S.A. now owns 336,431 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $38,915,000 after purchasing an additional 336,141 shares in the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC increased its holdings in Southern Copper by 10.6% during the 3rd quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 2,963,572 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $342,796,000 after purchasing an additional 283,562 shares during the period. BNP Paribas Financial Markets increased its holdings in Southern Copper by 1,601.3% during the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 192,571 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $22,275,000 after purchasing an additional 181,252 shares during the period. Finally, abrdn plc raised its position in Southern Copper by 4.4% in the 4th quarter. abrdn plc now owns 2,849,638 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $260,428,000 after purchasing an additional 118,909 shares in the last quarter. 7.94% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently weighed in on SCCO. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Southern Copper from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and cut their target price for the stock from $106.30 to $102.00 in a research note on Thursday, December 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of Southern Copper from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $92.50 price target for the company in a report on Monday, December 2nd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Southern Copper has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $94.81.

Southern Copper Stock Down 0.9 %

SCCO stock opened at $85.95 on Wednesday. The company has a current ratio of 2.77, a quick ratio of 2.31 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.64. Southern Copper Co. has a twelve month low of $79.59 and a twelve month high of $129.79. The company’s 50 day moving average is $94.04 and its two-hundred day moving average is $101.36. The stock has a market cap of $67.51 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.89, a PEG ratio of 1.90 and a beta of 1.13.

Southern Copper (NYSE:SCCO) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 12th. The basic materials company reported $1.01 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.02 by ($0.01). Southern Copper had a net margin of 29.53% and a return on equity of 40.27%. Research analysts expect that Southern Copper Co. will post 4.66 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Southern Copper Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, February 27th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 11th were given a dividend of $0.70 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 11th. This represents a $2.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.26%. This is a boost from Southern Copper’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.60. Southern Copper’s payout ratio is 64.81%.

About Southern Copper

Southern Copper Corporation engages in mining, exploring, smelting, and refining copper and other minerals in Peru, Mexico, Argentina, Ecuador, and Chile. The company is involved in the mining, milling, and flotation of copper ore to produce copper and molybdenum concentrates; smelting of copper concentrates to produce blister and anode copper; refining of anode copper to produce copper cathodes; production of molybdenum concentrate and sulfuric acid; production of refined silver, gold, and other materials; and mining and processing of zinc, copper, molybdenum, silver, gold, and lead.