Blackstone Inc. $BX Stake Reduced by Fifth Third Bancorp

Key Points

• Fifth Third Bancorp reduced its stake in Blackstone Inc. by 21.6%, selling almost 25,000 shares to own 90,738 shares, worth approximately $13.57 million.
• Major shareholder Bx Buzz ML-1 Gp LLC sold 16.69 million shares of Blackstone for over $104 million, while another major shareholder increased their stake by 39.79% with a purchase of over 1.18 million shares.
• Blackstone recently announced a quarterly dividend of $1.03 per share, indicating an annualized yield of 2.3%, a positive increase from the prior dividend of $0.93.

Fifth Third Bancorp decreased its position in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX - Free Report) by 21.6% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 90,738 shares of the asset manager's stock after selling 24,998 shares during the quarter. Fifth Third Bancorp's holdings in Blackstone were worth $13,573,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC grew its holdings in Blackstone by 519,669.1% in the 2nd quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC now owns 70,132,441 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $10,490,411,000 after buying an additional 70,118,948 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Blackstone by 1.6% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,997,581 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $9,504,702,000 after purchasing an additional 1,102,949 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of Blackstone by 16.3% during the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,292,320 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $739,761,000 after purchasing an additional 742,829 shares in the last quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC lifted its holdings in Blackstone by 4.4% in the first quarter. UBS AM A Distinct Business Unit of UBS Asset Management Americas LLC now owns 4,291,546 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $599,872,000 after purchasing an additional 182,526 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its stake in Blackstone by 2.9% during the 1st quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,162,867 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $581,886,000 after buying an additional 117,724 shares during the period. 70.00% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms recently commented on BX. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on shares of Blackstone from $153.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Friday, July 11th. Evercore ISI raised their target price on Blackstone from $165.00 to $197.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Friday, July 25th. Citigroup reissued a "market perform" rating on shares of Blackstone in a report on Saturday, July 19th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their target price on shares of Blackstone from $170.00 to $192.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Friday, July 25th. Finally, JMP Securities lifted their price target on shares of Blackstone from $180.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a "market outperform" rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $172.38.

Insider Activity

In related news, major shareholder Bx Buzz Ml-1 Gp Llc sold 16,689,884 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $6.26, for a total transaction of $104,478,673.84. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, major shareholder Holdings I. L.P. Blackstone bought 1,189,532 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, July 18th. The stock was purchased at an average price of $25.22 per share, for a total transaction of $29,999,997.04. Following the purchase, the insider directly owned 4,178,771 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $105,388,604.62. This represents a 39.79% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. In the last three months, insiders bought 3,727,877 shares of company stock valued at $95,046,625 and sold 16,871,634 shares valued at $135,328,376. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company's stock.

Blackstone Stock Down 3.6%

BX stock opened at $178.21 on Thursday. The company's 50 day simple moving average is $173.90 and its 200-day simple moving average is $152.30. Blackstone Inc. has a 52-week low of $115.66 and a 52-week high of $200.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 0.74 and a quick ratio of 0.74. The firm has a market capitalization of $131.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 47.91, a P/E/G ratio of 1.50 and a beta of 1.77.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX - Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The asset manager reported $1.21 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.10 by $0.11. Blackstone had a net margin of 20.83% and a return on equity of 20.47%. The company had revenue of $3.07 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.77 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.98 EPS. The company's revenue was up 32.7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Blackstone Inc. will post 5.87 EPS for the current year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 11th. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 4th were given a $1.03 dividend. This represents a $4.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.3%. This is a positive change from Blackstone's previous quarterly dividend of $0.93. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, August 4th. Blackstone's payout ratio is currently 110.75%.

Blackstone Company Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.

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