Savvy Advisors Inc. Acquires 2,357 Shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX)

Savvy Advisors Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX) by 39.2% in the first quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 8,369 shares of the asset manager’s stock after acquiring an additional 2,357 shares during the period. Savvy Advisors Inc.’s holdings in Blackstone were worth $1,170,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

A number of other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in BX. Capital Research Global Investors acquired a new stake in shares of Blackstone during the 4th quarter worth about $239,837,000. GAMMA Investing LLC increased its position in Blackstone by 14,608.6% in the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,322,598 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $184,873,000 after acquiring an additional 1,313,606 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in Blackstone by 1.6% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,997,581 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $9,504,702,000 after acquiring an additional 1,102,949 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. increased its position in Blackstone by 16.3% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,292,320 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $739,761,000 after acquiring an additional 742,829 shares in the last quarter. Finally, National Bank of Canada FI increased its position in Blackstone by 136.9% in the 1st quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 1,270,233 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $177,544,000 after acquiring an additional 734,109 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.00% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have weighed in on BX shares. Piper Sandler raised their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $157.00 to $181.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, July 28th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on shares of Blackstone from $170.00 to $192.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 25th. JMP Securities lifted their price target on shares of Blackstone from $180.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. UBS Group lowered their price target on shares of Blackstone from $180.00 to $175.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, April 22nd. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their price target on shares of Blackstone from $168.00 to $180.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Blackstone presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $170.12.

Insider Transactions at Blackstone

In related news, Director Joseph Baratta sold 100,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, August 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $167.36, for a total transaction of $16,736,000.00. Following the transaction, the director directly owned 808,757 shares in the company, valued at approximately $135,353,571.52. The trade was a 11.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, major shareholder Holdings I. L.P. Blackstone bought 1,189,532 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 18th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $25.22 per share, for a total transaction of $29,999,997.04. Following the completion of the acquisition, the insider owned 4,178,771 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $105,388,604.62. The trade was a 39.79% increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. 1.00% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Blackstone Stock Performance

Shares of BX opened at $168.93 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a quick ratio of 0.75 and a current ratio of 0.74. Blackstone Inc. has a twelve month low of $115.66 and a twelve month high of $200.96. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $155.60 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $150.51. The firm has a market cap of $123.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 45.41, a PEG ratio of 1.37 and a beta of 1.71.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The asset manager reported $1.21 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.10 by $0.11. Blackstone had a net margin of 20.83% and a return on equity of 20.47%. The firm had revenue of $3.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.77 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.98 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 32.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts forecast that Blackstone Inc. will post 5.87 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, August 11th. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 4th will be given a $1.03 dividend. This is a boost from Blackstone’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.93. This represents a $4.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, August 4th. Blackstone’s payout ratio is presently 110.75%.

Blackstone Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.