1620 Investment Advisors Inc. Buys Shares of 1,933 Eastern Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBC)

1620 Investment Advisors Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Eastern Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBC) in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund bought 1,933 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $33,000.

Other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Swiss National Bank increased its holdings in Eastern Bankshares by 21.0% during the 3rd quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 378,564 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,205,000 after acquiring an additional 65,764 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its holdings in Eastern Bankshares by 20.3% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 6,940,433 shares of the company’s stock valued at $113,754,000 after acquiring an additional 1,170,276 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its holdings in Eastern Bankshares by 5.8% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 1,591,712 shares of the company’s stock valued at $26,088,000 after acquiring an additional 86,810 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Eastern Bankshares by 23.0% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 4,587,497 shares of the company’s stock valued at $75,203,000 after acquiring an additional 859,136 shares in the last quarter. Finally, M&T Bank Corp purchased a new position in Eastern Bankshares during the 3rd quarter valued at about $511,000. 71.68% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Eastern Bankshares Price Performance

Eastern Bankshares stock opened at $16.59 on Friday. Eastern Bankshares, Inc. has a 12-month low of $12.22 and a 12-month high of $19.40. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.76 and a beta of 0.95. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $17.58 and its two-hundred day moving average is $17.34.

Eastern Bankshares (NASDAQ:EBC) last released its earnings results on Thursday, January 23rd. The company reported $0.34 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.29 by $0.05. Eastern Bankshares had a net margin of 11.07% and a return on equity of 6.02%. As a group, analysts forecast that Eastern Bankshares, Inc. will post 1.49 EPS for the current year.

Eastern Bankshares Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 14th. Investors of record on Monday, March 3rd were given a $0.12 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, March 3rd. This represents a $0.48 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.89%. Eastern Bankshares’s dividend payout ratio is presently 71.64%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CFO R David Rosato bought 10,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, March 11th. The shares were acquired at an average cost of $15.40 per share, with a total value of $154,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 20,000 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $308,000. The trade was a 100.00 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 1.15% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Separately, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $22.00 price target (up from $21.00) on shares of Eastern Bankshares in a research note on Monday, January 27th.

Eastern Bankshares Profile

Eastern Bankshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Eastern Bank that provides banking products and services primarily to retail, commercial, and small business customers. The company provides deposit accounts, interest checking accounts, money market accounts, savings accounts, and time certificates of deposit accounts.