Fifth Third Bancorp Decreases Holdings in Qiagen N.V. (NYSE:QGEN)

Fifth Third Bancorp lowered its position in shares of Qiagen N.V. (NYSE:QGEN - Free Report) by 11.8% in the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 55,445 shares of the company's stock after selling 7,429 shares during the period. Fifth Third Bancorp's holdings in Qiagen were worth $2,226,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Groupama Asset Managment grew its holdings in Qiagen by 8,074.0% during the fourth quarter. Groupama Asset Managment now owns 31,817,740 shares of the company's stock worth $1,416,844,000 after acquiring an additional 32,216,761 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Qiagen in the fourth quarter valued at about $181,529,000. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA boosted its holdings in Qiagen by 9.5% during the fourth quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 25,319,332 shares of the company's stock worth $1,127,470,000 after buying an additional 2,202,040 shares in the last quarter. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH acquired a new position in Qiagen during the fourth quarter worth about $95,746,000. Finally, Caisse Des Depots ET Consignations purchased a new position in Qiagen in the fourth quarter valued at about $53,991,000. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Qiagen Trading Up 0.1%

Shares of Qiagen stock traded up $0.04 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $46.59. 527,277 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,337,259. The stock has a market capitalization of $10.36 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 116.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.42 and a beta of 0.67. Qiagen N.V. has a twelve month low of $37.63 and a twelve month high of $49.30. The company has a current ratio of 3.37, a quick ratio of 2.83 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.40. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $43.26 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.29.

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 7th. The company reported $0.55 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.50 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $483.46 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $465.66 million. Qiagen had a return on equity of 14.61% and a net margin of 4.68%. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 5.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.44 EPS. Research analysts forecast that Qiagen N.V. will post 2.26 EPS for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

QGEN has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Robert W. Baird boosted their price target on Qiagen from $42.00 to $43.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Monday, April 21st. Baird R W downgraded Qiagen from a "strong-buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 19th. Redburn Atlantic lowered Qiagen from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating in a report on Friday, April 4th. Finally, Wall Street Zen raised Qiagen from a "buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Thursday, May 15th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Qiagen presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $48.42.

About Qiagen

QIAGEN NV is a holding company, which engages in the provision of Sample to Insight solutions that enable customers to gain valuable molecular insights from samples containing the building blocks of life. The company sample technologies isolate and process DNA, RNA, and proteins from blood, tissue, and other materials.