Bank of America Corp DE Purchases 871,370 Shares of Ares Capital Co. (NASDAQ:ARCC)

Bank of America Corp DE grew its position in shares of Ares Capital Co. (NASDAQ:ARCC - Free Report) by 12.3% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 7,951,926 shares of the investment management company's stock after acquiring an additional 871,370 shares during the quarter. Bank of America Corp DE owned about 1.18% of Ares Capital worth $174,068,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of ARCC. Van ECK Associates Corp increased its stake in Ares Capital by 11.8% during the 4th quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 14,145,706 shares of the investment management company's stock valued at $309,649,000 after purchasing an additional 1,489,552 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its holdings in shares of Ares Capital by 26.0% in the 4th quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 4,268,547 shares of the investment management company's stock worth $93,439,000 after acquiring an additional 881,450 shares during the last quarter. Generali Asset Management SPA SGR bought a new position in Ares Capital in the 4th quarter valued at about $84,426,000. Advisors Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in Ares Capital by 3.1% during the 4th quarter. Advisors Capital Management LLC now owns 3,523,651 shares of the investment management company's stock valued at $77,133,000 after purchasing an additional 105,526 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Ares Capital during the 4th quarter worth approximately $58,159,000. 27.38% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

ARCC has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Raymond James lowered Ares Capital from an "outperform" rating to a "market perform" rating in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods cut their price target on shares of Ares Capital from $23.00 to $22.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, April 8th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their target price on shares of Ares Capital from $24.50 to $22.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 24th. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their target price on Ares Capital from $24.00 to $23.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Tuesday. Finally, StockNews.com lowered Ares Capital from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a report on Friday, February 7th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating, five have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Ares Capital has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $22.00.

Ares Capital Stock Up 0.4 %

Shares of NASDAQ ARCC opened at $21.08 on Friday. The business's fifty day moving average price is $21.11 and its 200-day moving average price is $21.89. Ares Capital Co. has a one year low of $18.26 and a one year high of $23.84. The stock has a market capitalization of $14.54 billion, a PE ratio of 8.60 and a beta of 0.70. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.03, a current ratio of 1.21 and a quick ratio of 1.21.

Ares Capital (NASDAQ:ARCC - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, April 29th. The investment management company reported $0.50 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.54 by ($0.04). The business had revenue of $599.00 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $769.32 million. Ares Capital had a return on equity of 11.54% and a net margin of 50.90%. Ares Capital's revenue for the quarter was up 4.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.59 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Ares Capital Co. will post 2.19 EPS for the current year.

Ares Capital Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 30th. Stockholders of record on Friday, June 13th will be given a $0.48 dividend. This represents a $1.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 9.11%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 13th. Ares Capital's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 93.66%.

Ares Capital Profile

Ares Capital Corporation is a business development company specializing in acquisition, recapitalization, mezzanine debt, restructurings, rescue financing, and leveraged buyout transactions of middle market companies. It also makes growth capital and general refinancing. It prefers to make investments in companies engaged in the basic and growth manufacturing, business services, consumer products, health care products and services, and information technology service sectors.

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