Hershey Company (The) $HSY Shares Bought by Pictet Asset Management Holding SA

Pictet Asset Management Holding SA grew its stake in Hershey Company (The) (NYSE:HSY) by 3.6% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 102,320 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 3,538 shares during the quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA owned approximately 0.05% of Hershey worth $16,127,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Hershey during the second quarter valued at approximately $2,303,889,000. GQG Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Hershey in the second quarter worth about $485,436,000. Bank of America Corp DE purchased a new stake in Hershey during the 2nd quarter valued at about $274,871,000. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its holdings in Hershey by 1.7% in the 1st quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,210,466 shares of the company’s stock valued at $251,706,000 after acquiring an additional 19,772 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Envestnet Asset Management Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Hershey by 11.8% during the 2nd quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 1,128,711 shares of the company’s stock worth $198,032,000 after purchasing an additional 118,825 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 57.96% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

HSY has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. UBS Group lowered their price objective on Hershey from $178.00 to $175.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, October 30th. Sanford C. Bernstein reaffirmed a “market perform” rating and set a $201.00 price target (down from $208.00) on shares of Hershey in a research report on Friday, July 31st. Jefferies Financial Group reissued a “hold” rating and set a $178.00 target price (down from $190.00) on shares of Hershey in a research note on Wednesday, October 14th. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Hershey from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c-)” rating in a research report on Wednesday, November 4th. Finally, TD Cowen lowered shares of Hershey from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and lowered their target price for the stock from $198.00 to $173.00 in a research note on Friday, October 30th. Seven analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seventeen have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Hershey currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $193.81.

Hershey Stock Down 1.8%

Hershey stock opened at $173.29 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $34.83 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.60, a P/E/G ratio of 1.59 and a beta of 0.08. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $168.19 and its 200-day simple moving average is $188.05. Hershey Company has a twelve month low of $156.16 and a twelve month high of $239.48. The company has a current ratio of 1.24, a quick ratio of 0.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.92.

Hershey (NYSE:HSY) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 29th. The company reported $2.64 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.11 by $0.53. Hershey had a return on equity of 37.12% and a net margin of 14.63%. The company had revenue of $3.28 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.25 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.30 EPS. Hershey’s revenue was up 3.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts expect that Hershey Company will post 8.63 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hershey Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, December 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, November 16th will be issued a dividend of $1.4520 per share. This represents a $5.81 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 16th. Hershey’s payout ratio is 65.72%.

Hershey Company Profile

The Hershey Company is a global confectionery company best known for its chocolate and candy products. Milton S. Hershey established the Hershey Chocolate Company in 1894, and the company is headquartered in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Its portfolio includes chocolate bars, packaged candy, gum, mints and other snacks. Well-known brands include Hershey’s, Reese’s, Kisses, Jolly Rancher and Ice Breakers; the company also sells salty snacks under brands such as SkinnyPop and Dot’s Pretzels. Hershey sells its products primarily in North America and also serves consumers in international markets through its operations and distribution partners.