KLA Corporation $KLAC Shares Bought by Unio Capital LLC

Unio Capital LLC lifted its stake in KLA Corporation (NASDAQ:KLAC) by 880.7% during the second quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 122,766 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after buying an additional 110,248 shares during the period. KLA accounts for approximately 7.0% of Unio Capital LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 7th largest holding. Unio Capital LLC’s holdings in KLA were worth $37,040,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. TOWER TRUST & INVESTMENT Co increased its position in shares of KLA by 829.7% during the 2nd quarter. TOWER TRUST & INVESTMENT Co now owns 7,456 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $2,249,000 after purchasing an additional 6,654 shares during the last quarter. Abacus FCF Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of KLA in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $20,763,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp acquired a new stake in shares of KLA in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $2,522,430,000. Handelsbanken Fonder AB grew its stake in shares of KLA by 978.2% in the second quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB now owns 858,984 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock valued at $259,164,000 after buying an additional 779,317 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Butensky & Cohen Financial Security Inc. increased its holdings in KLA by 600.7% during the second quarter. Butensky & Cohen Financial Security Inc. now owns 31,561 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $9,522,000 after buying an additional 27,057 shares during the last quarter. 86.65% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have commented on KLAC. Scotiabank set a $200.00 price target on shares of KLA in a research note on Wednesday, June 10th. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $225.00 target price on shares of KLA in a research note on Wednesday, July 29th. Oppenheimer reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $260.00 price target (up from $200.00) on shares of KLA in a report on Thursday, July 16th. Cantor Fitzgerald reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $325.00 target price on shares of KLA in a report on Wednesday, July 29th. Finally, Zacks Research raised shares of KLA from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nineteen have given a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $222.22.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other KLA news, CEO Richard P. Wallace sold 87,568 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, August 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $198.95, for a total transaction of $17,421,653.60. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 778,944 shares in the company, valued at $154,970,908.80. This trade represents a 10.11% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CFO Bren D. Higgins sold 27,701 shares of KLA stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $265.69, for a total value of $7,359,878.69. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 263,472 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $70,001,875.68. This represents a 9.51% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold 258,533 shares of company stock valued at $55,977,470 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 91.48% of the company’s stock.

KLA Trading Down 2.6%

Shares of KLA stock opened at $170.89 on Wednesday. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $209.84 and a 200-day moving average of $188.27. The stock has a market cap of $223.28 billion, a PE ratio of 46.60, a PEG ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 1.45. KLA Corporation has a 52-week low of $83.22 and a 52-week high of $307.37. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.93, a quick ratio of 2.03 and a current ratio of 2.88.

KLA (NASDAQ:KLAC) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 28th. The semiconductor company reported $1.05 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.00 by $0.05. KLA had a net margin of 35.57% and a return on equity of 87.66%. The business had revenue of $3.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.61 billion. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.94 earnings per share. KLA’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.2% compared to the same quarter last year. KLA has set its Q1 2027 guidance at 1.060-1.260 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that KLA Corporation will post 5.42 EPS for the current year.

KLA Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 17th were given a $0.23 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, August 17th. This is a positive change from KLA’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.23. This represents a $0.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.5%. KLA’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 25.07%.

KLA Profile

KLA is a provider of process control and yield management solutions for the semiconductor and related microelectronics industries. The company designs and manufactures equipment, software and services used by chipmakers to analyze and control manufacturing processes, detect defects, measure critical dimensions and improve yield across wafer fabrication, photomask and packaging operations. KLA’s offerings are aimed at enabling production of advanced logic, memory, and specialty devices at progressively smaller technology nodes and more complex package structures.

Its product portfolio includes optical and e-beam inspection systems, metrology tools for critical dimension and film measurement, mask and reticle inspection platforms, as well as enterprise software and data analytics that aggregate process data and drive automated process control.