ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. $ASX Shares Acquired by Hsbc Holdings PLC

Key Points

• HSBC Holdings PLC increased its stake in ASE Technology by 7.5% in the first quarter, buying 140,628 additional shares and bringing its total to 2,014,412 shares worth about $43.7 million.
• ASE Technology has drawn a generally positive analyst outlook, with recent upgrades from Wall Street Zen and Zacks Research, and a consensus rating of “Buy” according to MarketBeat data.
• The semiconductor company reported better-than-expected quarterly results, posting EPS of $0.20 versus estimates of $0.17, and it also raised its annual dividend to $0.4171 per share from $0.36.

Hsbc Holdings PLC increased its holdings in shares of ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. (NYSE:ASX - Free Report) by 7.5% during the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 2,014,412 shares of the semiconductor company's stock after acquiring an additional 140,628 shares during the period. Hsbc Holdings PLC owned approximately 0.09% of ASE Technology worth $43,654,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Parallel Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of ASE Technology by 1.9% during the 4th quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 25,975 shares of the semiconductor company's stock worth $418,000 after purchasing an additional 482 shares in the last quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC increased its holdings in shares of ASE Technology by 5.5% in the 4th quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC now owns 11,223 shares of the semiconductor company's stock valued at $181,000 after purchasing an additional 589 shares in the last quarter. Vest Financial LLC lifted its stake in shares of ASE Technology by 5.2% in the fourth quarter. Vest Financial LLC now owns 12,954 shares of the semiconductor company's stock valued at $209,000 after purchasing an additional 637 shares during the period. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of ASE Technology by 0.5% in the fourth quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 120,598 shares of the semiconductor company's stock valued at $1,942,000 after purchasing an additional 643 shares during the period. Finally, Transamerica Financial Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in ASE Technology by 24.8% during the fourth quarter. Transamerica Financial Advisors LLC now owns 3,435 shares of the semiconductor company's stock worth $55,000 after buying an additional 683 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 6.80% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages have weighed in on ASX. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of ASE Technology from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research report on Sunday, April 5th. Weiss Ratings reissued a "hold (c+)" rating on shares of ASE Technology in a research note on Tuesday, June 9th. Finally, Zacks Research upgraded ASE Technology from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a report on Tuesday, May 5th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has given a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Buy".

ASE Technology Stock Performance

NYSE:ASX opened at $36.99 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.89 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.53. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $38.44 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $28.49. ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. has a twelve month low of $9.30 and a twelve month high of $45.51. The company has a market capitalization of $82.24 billion, a P/E ratio of 54.39 and a beta of 1.69.

ASE Technology (NYSE:ASX - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The semiconductor company reported $0.20 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.17 by $0.03. ASE Technology had a net margin of 7.03% and a return on equity of 13.48%. The company had revenue of $5.43 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.32 billion. As a group, research analysts expect that ASE Technology Holding Co., Ltd. will post 0.84 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

ASE Technology Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced an annual dividend, which will be paid on Friday, August 7th. Shareholders of record on Monday, July 6th will be issued a dividend of $0.4171 per share. This is a boost from ASE Technology's previous annual dividend of $0.36. The ex-dividend date is Monday, July 6th. This represents a yield of 96.0%. ASE Technology's payout ratio is currently 45.59%.

ASE Technology Profile

ASE Technology Holding Co, Ltd. NYSE: ASX, commonly referred to as ASE, is a Taiwan-based provider of semiconductor assembly and testing services. The company focuses on back-end semiconductor manufacturing and related services that prepare integrated circuits and other semiconductor devices for final use. Its core activities include advanced IC packaging, final testing, wafer probing, and related engineering and supply-chain support for semiconductor customers.

ASE offers a range of products and technical capabilities designed to meet increasingly complex packaging and system-in-package requirements.

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