Greif (NYSE:GEF) Stock Gets Downgrade from Wall Street Zen

Greif (NYSE:GEF) was downgraded by analysts at Wall Street Zen from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report issued on Saturday, Wall Street Zen reports.

Several other equities research analysts have also commented on GEF. Raymond James Financial upgraded Greif from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $90.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Friday, October 16th. Bank of America downgraded Greif from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and set a $70.00 target price for the company. in a report on Tuesday, July 14th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of Greif in a research note on Friday, October 30th. Truist Financial reissued a “hold” rating and issued a $88.00 price target (down from $94.00) on shares of Greif in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company cut their price target on Greif from $90.00 to $88.00 and set a “cautious” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, October 19th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have issued a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Greif presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $82.20.

Greif Price Performance

GEF stock opened at $72.50 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.02, a current ratio of 1.33 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.26. The firm has a market cap of $3.35 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 16.36, a PEG ratio of 0.57 and a beta of 0.79. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $81.81 and its 200 day simple moving average is $74.69. Greif has a 12-month low of $57.07 and a 12-month high of $90.57.

Greif (NYSE:GEF) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, November 3rd. The industrial products company reported $0.87 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.12 by ($0.25). Greif had a return on equity of 7.78% and a net margin of 5.91%. The business had revenue of $1.14 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.11 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.58 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 4.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts expect that Greif will post 4.59 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Bala Sathyanarayanan sold 1,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $109.67, for a total value of $109,670.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 7,549 shares in the company, valued at $827,898.83. This trade represents a 11.70% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, SVP Timothy Bergwall sold 2,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $81.82, for a total value of $163,640.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 51,832 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,240,894.24. The trade was a 3.72% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 5,000 shares of company stock valued at $439,590. 7.70% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Greif

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings in Greif by 35.0% during the second quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 246,492 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $18,361,000 after buying an additional 63,843 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Greif by 5.9% in the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 90,939 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $6,099,000 after buying an additional 5,071 shares in the last quarter. Squarepoint Ops LLC lifted its stake in shares of Greif by 29.1% in the second quarter. Squarepoint Ops LLC now owns 36,906 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $2,749,000 after buying an additional 8,322 shares in the last quarter. Engineers Gate Manager LP grew its holdings in shares of Greif by 362.2% during the second quarter. Engineers Gate Manager LP now owns 31,706 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $2,362,000 after buying an additional 24,846 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Wedge Capital Management L L P NC grew its holdings in shares of Greif by 10.8% during the second quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC now owns 27,528 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $2,051,000 after buying an additional 2,694 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 45.74% of the company’s stock.

About Greif

Greif, Inc is a global industrial packaging company that makes products used to store and transport goods. Its offerings include steel, plastic and fiber drums, intermediate bulk containers, jerrycans and other rigid packaging, as well as reconditioned containers and related services.

The company also provides packaging accessories and services such as container filling, supply-chain support and packaging design. Greif serves customers in industries including chemicals, food and beverage, petroleum and pharmaceuticals.

Founded in 1877 as a barrel manufacturer, Greif has expanded its operations to serve customers across North America, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America.