Korea Investment CORP Acquires 21,200 Shares of Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR)

Korea Investment CORP lifted its holdings in shares of Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR) by 11.7% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 202,358 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after purchasing an additional 21,200 shares during the period. Korea Investment CORP owned 0.12% of Pentair worth $20,365,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Pentair by 11.3% during the 4th quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp now owns 96,087 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $9,670,000 after buying an additional 9,761 shares in the last quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. boosted its stake in Pentair by 202.8% during the fourth quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. now owns 171,173 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $17,227,000 after acquiring an additional 114,634 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in Pentair by 0.7% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 20,216,366 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $2,034,575,000 after purchasing an additional 148,031 shares during the period. Stevens Capital Management LP bought a new stake in Pentair in the fourth quarter valued at $741,000. Finally, LPL Financial LLC raised its holdings in shares of Pentair by 60.7% during the fourth quarter. LPL Financial LLC now owns 103,563 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $10,423,000 after purchasing an additional 39,134 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.37% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently commented on PNR shares. Citigroup reduced their target price on Pentair from $126.00 to $119.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, January 13th. StockNews.com upgraded Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, March 11th. Northcoast Research upgraded Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 5th. Baird R W upgraded shares of Pentair from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 25th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on shares of Pentair from $126.00 to $125.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 24th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, twelve have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $112.27.

Pentair Stock Performance

NYSE PNR opened at $86.76 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $14.30 billion, a PE ratio of 23.20, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.87 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.46, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a current ratio of 1.60. Pentair plc has a 52-week low of $72.63 and a 52-week high of $110.71. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $94.54 and a 200 day simple moving average of $98.77.

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 4th. The industrial products company reported $1.08 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.02 by $0.06. Pentair had a net margin of 15.32% and a return on equity of 20.94%. The company had revenue of $972.90 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $970.95 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.87 EPS. Pentair’s quarterly revenue was down 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts predict that Pentair plc will post 4.77 EPS for the current year.

Pentair Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 2nd. Investors of record on Friday, April 18th will be issued a $0.25 dividend. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.15%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 17th. Pentair’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 26.74%.

About Pentair

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets.