News Corporation $NWSA Shares Sold by Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc.

Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. cut its stake in shares of News Corporation (NASDAQ:NWSA) by 2.5% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 758,973 shares of the company’s stock after selling 19,534 shares during the period. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc.’s holdings in News were worth $21,745,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of NWSA. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. purchased a new stake in shares of News in the third quarter worth about $79,840,000. Bank of America Corp DE grew its stake in News by 80.9% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 4,069,041 shares of the company’s stock valued at $101,441,000 after acquiring an additional 1,819,652 shares in the last quarter. Sei Investments Co. grew its stake in News by 120.6% during the first quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 2,326,616 shares of the company’s stock valued at $58,002,000 after acquiring an additional 1,272,083 shares in the last quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP increased its holdings in News by 174.3% during the 1st quarter. Quantinno Capital Management LP now owns 1,911,329 shares of the company’s stock worth $47,649,000 after acquiring an additional 1,214,648 shares during the period. Finally, Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its holdings in News by 331.0% during the 2nd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 730,471 shares of the company’s stock worth $18,138,000 after acquiring an additional 561,005 shares during the period. 66.97% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

NWSA has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Wall Street Zen cut shares of News from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Saturday, October 24th. Raymond James Financial started coverage on shares of News in a research report on Monday, October 19th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $35.00 price target for the company. Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and issued a $35.00 price target on shares of News in a report on Thursday, August 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price objective on News from $36.00 to $38.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, August 21st. Finally, Zacks Research lowered News from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, August 7th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, News currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $37.80.

News Stock Down 13.4%

Shares of NASDAQ NWSA opened at $26.48 on Friday. News Corporation has a 12 month low of $22.20 and a 12 month high of $31.66. The company has a current ratio of 1.62, a quick ratio of 1.51 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.22. The firm has a market capitalization of $14.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.64 and a beta of 1.01. The business has a 50-day moving average of $29.66 and a 200-day moving average of $26.96.

News (NASDAQ:NWSA) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, November 4th. The company reported $0.28 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.26 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $2.28 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.27 billion. News had a net margin of 6.76% and a return on equity of 7.40%. News’s quarterly revenue was up 6.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.22 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that News Corporation will post 1.30 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

About News

News Corp is a global media and information-services company whose Class A common stock trades on the Nasdaq under the symbol NWSA. The company operates a portfolio of businesses spanning digital and print publishing, subscription products, professional information, real estate services and book publishing.

Its principal businesses include Dow Jones, which provides financial news, data, research and professional information through publications such as The Wall Street Journal and Barron’s; News Corp Australia and News UK, which operate newspapers and digital news platforms; and HarperCollins Publishers, which publishes fiction, nonfiction, educational and religious titles.