Baird Financial Group Inc. Cuts Stock Holdings in Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

Baird Financial Group Inc. reduced its position in shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR - Free Report) by 1.8% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 369,089 shares of the conglomerate's stock after selling 6,847 shares during the period. Baird Financial Group Inc. owned 0.05% of Danaher worth $84,725,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Danaher by 0.5% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 59,750,122 shares of the conglomerate's stock worth $13,715,641,000 after buying an additional 315,912 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in Danaher by 2.4% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,358,206 shares of the conglomerate's stock valued at $3,056,996,000 after acquiring an additional 315,446 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Danaher during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $2,130,740,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp increased its stake in shares of Danaher by 5.4% during the 4th quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 8,589,019 shares of the conglomerate's stock worth $1,971,609,000 after purchasing an additional 441,012 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Northern Trust Corp raised its holdings in shares of Danaher by 14.3% in the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 7,934,991 shares of the conglomerate's stock worth $1,821,477,000 after purchasing an additional 992,594 shares during the period. 79.05% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have issued reports on the company. Stifel Nicolaus raised Danaher from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating and set a $260.00 target price for the company in a research report on Friday, March 14th. Guggenheim reissued a "buy" rating and issued a $250.00 price objective on shares of Danaher in a report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on shares of Danaher from $280.00 to $240.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Barclays boosted their price target on shares of Danaher from $205.00 to $215.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 22nd. Finally, Robert W. Baird reduced their price objective on shares of Danaher from $231.00 to $225.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Danaher has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $264.40.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Danaher news, EVP Christopher Paul Riley sold 15,805 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $198.00, for a total transaction of $3,129,390.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 15,179 shares in the company, valued at $3,005,442. This represents a 51.01 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. 11.10% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Danaher Trading Up 1.2 %

Shares of DHR opened at $199.15 on Monday. Danaher Co. has a 1-year low of $171.00 and a 1-year high of $281.70. The company has a market capitalization of $142.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 37.72, a P/E/G ratio of 2.66 and a beta of 0.80. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31, a current ratio of 1.40 and a quick ratio of 1.05. The firm's 50 day simple moving average is $199.78 and its 200 day simple moving average is $221.43.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 22nd. The conglomerate reported $1.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $1.62 by $0.26. The company had revenue of $5.74 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.58 billion. Danaher had a net margin of 16.33% and a return on equity of 10.82%. Sell-side analysts forecast that Danaher Co. will post 7.63 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Danaher Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, April 25th. Investors of record on Friday, March 28th were given a $0.32 dividend. This is an increase from Danaher's previous quarterly dividend of $0.27. The ex-dividend date was Friday, March 28th. This represents a $1.28 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.64%. Danaher's payout ratio is presently 24.85%.

Danaher Profile

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.

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