Cerity Partners LLC Sells 174,228 Shares of Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF)

Cerity Partners LLC trimmed its position in shares of Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF) by 37.8% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 286,619 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 174,228 shares during the quarter. Cerity Partners LLC’s holdings in Jefferies Financial Group were worth $22,471,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Assetmark Inc. grew its stake in Jefferies Financial Group by 925.4% in the fourth quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 2,584 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $203,000 after acquiring an additional 2,332 shares during the period. Friedenthal Financial bought a new position in shares of Jefferies Financial Group during the 4th quarter valued at about $772,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. grew its position in shares of Jefferies Financial Group by 7.2% in the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 2,504,513 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $154,153,000 after purchasing an additional 167,270 shares during the period. Plato Investment Management Ltd bought a new stake in Jefferies Financial Group during the 4th quarter worth approximately $788,000. Finally, Smartleaf Asset Management LLC raised its holdings in Jefferies Financial Group by 45.6% during the 4th quarter. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC now owns 907 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $72,000 after buying an additional 284 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 60.88% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

JEF has been the subject of several research reports. Oppenheimer downgraded shares of Jefferies Financial Group from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 19th. StockNews.com downgraded Jefferies Financial Group from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Monday, March 31st. Morgan Stanley cut Jefferies Financial Group from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and reduced their price objective for the stock from $75.00 to $41.00 in a research report on Monday. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group set a $75.00 target price on Jefferies Financial Group in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th.

Jefferies Financial Group Trading Down 2.7 %

Jefferies Financial Group stock opened at $41.02 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $8.46 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.77 and a beta of 1.29. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $61.89 and a 200-day moving average of $68.77. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.57, a current ratio of 1.07 and a quick ratio of 1.07. Jefferies Financial Group Inc. has a one year low of $38.97 and a one year high of $82.68.

Jefferies Financial Group (NYSE:JEF) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, March 26th. The financial services provider reported $0.60 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.88 by ($0.28). The company had revenue of $1.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.93 billion. Jefferies Financial Group had a net margin of 10.57% and a return on equity of 7.92%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 8.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.87 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts expect that Jefferies Financial Group Inc. will post 4.41 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Jefferies Financial Group Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 29th. Investors of record on Monday, May 19th will be issued a dividend of $0.40 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, May 19th. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.90%. Jefferies Financial Group’s payout ratio is 55.36%.

Jefferies Financial Group Profile

Jefferies Financial Group Inc operates as an investment banking and capital markets firm in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific. The company operates in two segments, Investment Banking and Capital Markets, and Asset Management. It provides investment banking, advisory services with respect to mergers or acquisitions, debt financing, restructurings or recapitalizations, and private capital advisory transactions; underwriting and placement services related to corporate debt, municipal bonds, mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities, equity and equity-linked securities, and loan syndication services; and corporate lending services.