Donaldson Capital Management LLC Cuts Stake in Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC)

Donaldson Capital Management LLC reduced its stake in Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) by 14.6% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 10,068 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 1,720 shares during the period. Donaldson Capital Management LLC’s holdings in Bank of America were worth $339,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of Bank of America by 108,111.3% during the fourth quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 193,168,025 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $6,397,725,000 after buying an additional 192,989,515 shares during the period. Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of Bank of America during the fourth quarter valued at about $3,436,543,000. Northern Trust Corp increased its position in shares of Bank of America by 2.1% during the third quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 67,648,727 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,852,222,000 after buying an additional 1,397,469 shares during the period. Barclays PLC increased its position in shares of Bank of America by 97.3% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 41,290,694 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,130,538,000 after buying an additional 20,362,295 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its position in shares of Bank of America by 1.9% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 40,518,019 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,109,383,000 after purchasing an additional 746,756 shares during the last quarter. 70.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Bank of America Trading Down 4.4 %

BAC stock traded down $1.58 on Tuesday, reaching $34.37. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 24,170,442 shares, compared to its average volume of 40,098,988. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $35.48 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $32.14. Bank of America Co. has a 12-month low of $24.96 and a 12-month high of $38.35. The firm has a market cap of $271.20 billion, a PE ratio of 11.71, a PEG ratio of 1.63 and a beta of 1.39. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.80.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Friday, January 12th. The financial services provider reported $0.70 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.69 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $22 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $23.70 billion. Bank of America had a return on equity of 11.38% and a net margin of 15.42%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 10.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.85 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Bank of America Co. will post 3.13 EPS for the current year.

Bank of America Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 29th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 1st were issued a $0.24 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, February 29th. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.79%. Bank of America’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 31.27%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms recently weighed in on BAC. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Bank of America from $39.00 to $43.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 2nd. BMO Capital Markets cut their target price on Bank of America from $37.00 to $36.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 16th. Evercore ISI upped their target price on Bank of America from $37.00 to $41.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 4th. Oppenheimer cut their target price on Bank of America from $50.00 to $46.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, March 19th. Finally, Erste Group Bank raised Bank of America from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 3rd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Bank of America presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $38.29.

About Bank of America

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides banking and financial products and services for individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, large corporations, and governments worldwide. It operates in four segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth & Investment Management (GWIM), Global Banking, and Global Markets.