Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS Has $3.62 Million Holdings in Las Vegas Sands Corp. $LVS

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS lifted its position in Las Vegas Sands Corp. (NYSE:LVS) by 5.9% in the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 83,184 shares of the casino operator’s stock after acquiring an additional 4,598 shares during the period. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Public School Empls Retrmt SYS’s holdings in Las Vegas Sands were worth $3,619,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of Las Vegas Sands by 5.8% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 41,249,208 shares of the casino operator’s stock valued at $1,593,457,000 after acquiring an additional 2,267,307 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its holdings in shares of Las Vegas Sands by 3.9% in the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 15,722,816 shares of the casino operator’s stock valued at $607,373,000 after purchasing an additional 592,321 shares during the period. ARGA Investment Management LP lifted its stake in Las Vegas Sands by 36.8% in the 2nd quarter. ARGA Investment Management LP now owns 10,040,975 shares of the casino operator’s stock valued at $436,883,000 after purchasing an additional 2,698,398 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. grew its holdings in Las Vegas Sands by 9.1% during the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 9,442,798 shares of the casino operator’s stock worth $364,775,000 after purchasing an additional 790,952 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Las Vegas Sands by 0.4% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 8,823,966 shares of the casino operator’s stock worth $382,294,000 after buying an additional 31,153 shares during the last quarter. 39.16% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

LVS has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Las Vegas Sands in a research report on Thursday, November 13th. Mizuho increased their price target on Las Vegas Sands from $56.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 23rd. Morgan Stanley raised their price target on Las Vegas Sands from $59.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 28th. Wells Fargo & Company started coverage on shares of Las Vegas Sands in a report on Tuesday. They issued an “equal weight” rating and a $66.00 price objective on the stock. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group raised their target price on shares of Las Vegas Sands from $57.00 to $64.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, October 24th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have given a Buy rating and six have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $64.60.

Las Vegas Sands Stock Performance

LVS opened at $64.05 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 7.42, a current ratio of 0.89 and a quick ratio of 1.21. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $56.12 and a 200 day simple moving average of $50.53. Las Vegas Sands Corp. has a 1 year low of $30.18 and a 1 year high of $67.83. The company has a market capitalization of $43.31 billion, a PE ratio of 28.98, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.62 and a beta of 1.03.

Las Vegas Sands (NYSE:LVS) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, October 22nd. The casino operator reported $0.78 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.62 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $3.33 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.04 billion. Las Vegas Sands had a return on equity of 73.14% and a net margin of 12.69%.The company’s revenue was up 24.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.44 earnings per share. Research analysts expect that Las Vegas Sands Corp. will post 2.6 EPS for the current year.

Las Vegas Sands Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, November 12th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 4th were paid a $0.25 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, November 4th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.6%. Las Vegas Sands’s payout ratio is 45.25%.

Insider Transactions at Las Vegas Sands

In other news, EVP D. Zachary Hudson sold 100,000 shares of Las Vegas Sands stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.99, for a total value of $6,499,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 13,735 shares in the company, valued at approximately $892,637.65. The trade was a 87.92% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Robert G. Goldstein sold 360,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $63.05, for a total value of $22,698,000.00. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold a total of 2,100,000 shares of company stock valued at $126,218,200 in the last three months. Insiders own 1.20% of the company’s stock.

Las Vegas Sands Profile

Las Vegas Sands Corp., together with its subsidiaries, develops, owns, and operates integrated resorts in Macao and Singapore. It owns and operates The Venetian Macao Resort Hotel, the Londoner Macao, The Parisian Macao, The Plaza Macao and Four Seasons Hotel Macao, Cotai Strip, and the Sands Macao in Macao, the People’s Republic of China; and Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.