Legal & General Group Plc Purchases New Shares in Hope Bancorp, Inc. $HOPE

Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new position in shares of Hope Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOPE) in the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm purchased 286,890 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $3,925,000.

Several other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new position in Hope Bancorp in the 2nd quarter valued at $252,703,000. HoldCo Asset Management LP purchased a new stake in shares of Hope Bancorp during the fourth quarter worth $32,838,000. Millennium Management LLC raised its position in shares of Hope Bancorp by 366.8% in the third quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 1,340,635 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $14,439,000 after buying an additional 1,053,434 shares during the last quarter. UBS Group AG raised its position in shares of Hope Bancorp by 73.5% in the fourth quarter. UBS Group AG now owns 1,972,716 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $21,621,000 after buying an additional 835,814 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new position in shares of Hope Bancorp in the second quarter worth about $10,384,000. 84.00% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts recently issued reports on HOPE shares. Weiss Ratings raised shares of Hope Bancorp from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 11th. DA Davidson boosted their target price on Hope Bancorp from $15.00 to $16.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 28th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upped their price target on Hope Bancorp from $14.00 to $15.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, August 3rd. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $15.50.

Hope Bancorp Price Performance

Hope Bancorp stock opened at $14.13 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.98, a quick ratio of 0.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $13.86 and a 200 day moving average price of $12.70. Hope Bancorp, Inc. has a 12-month low of $9.80 and a 12-month high of $14.59. The stock has a market cap of $1.81 billion, a P/E ratio of 14.13 and a beta of 0.83.

Hope Bancorp (NASDAQ:HOPE) last posted its earnings results on Monday, July 27th. The financial services provider reported $0.27 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.26 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $147.82 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $146.50 million. Hope Bancorp had a net margin of 12.53% and a return on equity of 5.71%. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted ($0.22) EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Hope Bancorp, Inc. will post 1.13 earnings per share for the current year.

Hope Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, August 20th. Investors of record on Thursday, August 6th were issued a $0.14 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, August 6th. This represents a $0.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.0%. Hope Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 56.00%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, Director Daisy Ha sold 26,995 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $14.24, for a total value of $384,408.80. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 346,120 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,928,748.80. This represents a 7.24% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Insiders own 2.27% of the company’s stock.

Hope Bancorp Company Profile

Hope Bancorp, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Hope Bank, a California-chartered financial institution serving small and middle-market businesses, professionals and affluent individuals. The company’s principal activities include accepting a variety of deposit products—such as checking accounts, savings and money market accounts, and time deposits—and extending commercial credit facilities. With a focus on community banking, Hope Bancorp tailors its offerings to meet the needs of clients in diverse industries, including real estate, professional services and import/export trade.

In its lending business, Hope Bancorp provides commercial real estate loans, construction financing, working capital lines of credit and equipment financing.