Focus Partners Wealth Invests $707,000 in AllianceBernstein Holding L.P. (NYSE:AB)

Focus Partners Wealth bought a new position in shares of AllianceBernstein Holding L.P. (NYSE:AB - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm bought 19,071 shares of the asset manager's stock, valued at approximately $707,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in AB. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. grew its holdings in AllianceBernstein by 19.8% during the 4th quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 1,929 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $72,000 after buying an additional 319 shares in the last quarter. Jump Financial LLC grew its holdings in AllianceBernstein by 1.5% during the 4th quarter. Jump Financial LLC now owns 29,600 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $1,098,000 after buying an additional 427 shares in the last quarter. Aptus Capital Advisors LLC grew its holdings in AllianceBernstein by 7.4% during the 4th quarter. Aptus Capital Advisors LLC now owns 8,721 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $323,000 after buying an additional 599 shares in the last quarter. Independent Advisor Alliance grew its holdings in AllianceBernstein by 7.1% during the 4th quarter. Independent Advisor Alliance now owns 9,518 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $353,000 after buying an additional 630 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Transce3nd LLC purchased a new stake in AllianceBernstein during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Institutional investors own 19.25% of the company's stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other AllianceBernstein news, Director Daniel G. Kaye sold 4,825 shares of AllianceBernstein stock in a transaction on Monday, May 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $40.80, for a total transaction of $196,860.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 39,877 shares of the company's stock, valued at $1,626,981.60. The trade was a 10.79% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Charles G.T. Stonehill sold 5,000 shares of AllianceBernstein stock in a transaction on Monday, May 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $41.18, for a total value of $205,900.00. Following the sale, the director now owns 20,923 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $861,609.14. This trade represents a 19.29% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 2.70% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the stock. TD Cowen cut their price objective on shares of AllianceBernstein from $37.50 to $34.00 and set a "hold" rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 9th. Bank of America lowered shares of AllianceBernstein from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and cut their price objective for the company from $42.00 to $38.00 in a report on Thursday, April 3rd. Wall Street Zen raised shares of AllianceBernstein from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a report on Saturday, May 10th. Barclays raised their target price on shares of AllianceBernstein from $36.00 to $37.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a report on Friday, April 25th. Finally, Evercore ISI cut their target price on shares of AllianceBernstein from $41.00 to $38.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 11th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $37.67.

AllianceBernstein Trading Up 1.0%

Shares of AB stock traded up $0.39 on Friday, reaching $39.23. The company's stock had a trading volume of 193,834 shares, compared to its average volume of 443,102. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $38.37 and its 200-day simple moving average is $37.48. AllianceBernstein Holding L.P. has a 1 year low of $30.57 and a 1 year high of $41.86. The company has a market capitalization of $4.34 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.55, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.78 and a beta of 0.85.

AllianceBernstein (NYSE:AB - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 24th. The asset manager reported $0.80 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.78 by $0.02. The company had revenue of $838.21 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $859.36 million. AllianceBernstein had a net margin of 9.46% and a return on equity of 17.88%. AllianceBernstein's quarterly revenue was down 5.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.73 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that AllianceBernstein Holding L.P. will post 3.58 earnings per share for the current year.

AllianceBernstein Cuts Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, May 22nd. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 5th were paid a dividend of $0.80 per share. This represents a $3.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 8.16%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, May 5th. AllianceBernstein's payout ratio is 86.02%.

AllianceBernstein Company Profile

AllianceBernstein Holding L.P. is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm is a related adviser The firm manages separate client focused portfolios for its clients. The firm primarily invests in common and preferred stocks, warrants and convertible securities, government and corporate fxed-income securities, commodities, currencies, real estate-related assets and infation-protected securities.