Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. Reduces Position in Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD)

Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. lowered its holdings in shares of Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD - Free Report) by 43.2% in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 3,798 shares of the basic materials company's stock after selling 2,892 shares during the quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc.'s holdings in Steel Dynamics were worth $475,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of STLD. Savant Capital LLC lifted its position in Steel Dynamics by 14.6% during the fourth quarter. Savant Capital LLC now owns 3,034 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $346,000 after purchasing an additional 387 shares during the last quarter. First Merchants Corp lifted its position in Steel Dynamics by 7.1% during the fourth quarter. First Merchants Corp now owns 3,646 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $416,000 after purchasing an additional 241 shares during the last quarter. Valeo Financial Advisors LLC lifted its position in Steel Dynamics by 9.2% during the fourth quarter. Valeo Financial Advisors LLC now owns 5,273 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $601,000 after purchasing an additional 445 shares during the last quarter. Spinnaker Trust lifted its position in Steel Dynamics by 0.9% during the fourth quarter. Spinnaker Trust now owns 50,184 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $5,724,000 after purchasing an additional 467 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Nations Financial Group Inc. IA ADV lifted its position in Steel Dynamics by 1.8% during the fourth quarter. Nations Financial Group Inc. IA ADV now owns 8,058 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $919,000 after purchasing an additional 145 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 82.41% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently issued reports on STLD. UBS Group upgraded shares of Steel Dynamics from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating and set a $149.00 target price for the company in a report on Monday, March 24th. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Steel Dynamics from an "underperform" rating to a "peer perform" rating in a report on Thursday, February 27th. BMO Capital Markets upgraded shares of Steel Dynamics from a "market perform" rating to an "outperform" rating and raised their target price for the stock from $135.00 to $145.00 in a report on Monday, March 31st. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Steel Dynamics from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a report on Friday, April 25th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of Steel Dynamics from $135.00 to $138.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a report on Thursday, April 24th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, Steel Dynamics presently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $147.44.

Insider Buying and Selling at Steel Dynamics

In other news, Director Gabriel Shaheen sold 1,254 shares of Steel Dynamics stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $134.11, for a total value of $168,173.94. Following the transaction, the director now owns 81,812 shares of the company's stock, valued at $10,971,807.32. The trade was a 1.51% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, SVP Miguel Alvarez sold 7,495 shares of Steel Dynamics stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, May 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $135.26, for a total transaction of $1,013,773.70. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 125,319 shares in the company, valued at approximately $16,950,647.94. The trade was a 5.64% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 6.30% of the company's stock.

Steel Dynamics Stock Down 2.3%

NASDAQ STLD traded down $3.05 during trading on Wednesday, reaching $130.11. 1,927,309 shares of the company's stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,538,353. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44, a current ratio of 2.74 and a quick ratio of 1.38. The firm has a market cap of $19.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.19, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.94 and a beta of 1.38. The company's 50 day simple moving average is $128.74 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $126.54. Steel Dynamics, Inc. has a 12-month low of $103.17 and a 12-month high of $155.56.

Steel Dynamics (NASDAQ:STLD - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, April 22nd. The basic materials company reported $1.44 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $1.40 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $4.37 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.17 billion. Steel Dynamics had a net margin of 6.80% and a return on equity of 13.26%. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $3.67 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Steel Dynamics, Inc. will post 9.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Steel Dynamics Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, July 11th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 30th will be given a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.54%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, June 30th. Steel Dynamics's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 26.42%.

Steel Dynamics declared that its Board of Directors has initiated a share repurchase program on Monday, February 24th that permits the company to repurchase $1.50 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization permits the basic materials company to reacquire up to 7.4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are often an indication that the company's leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Steel Dynamics Profile

Steel Dynamics, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a steel producer and metal recycler in the United States. The Steel Operations segment offers hot rolled, cold rolled, and coated steel products; parallel flange beams and channel sections, flat bars, large unequal leg angles, and reinforcing steel bars, as well as standard strength carbon, intermediate alloy hardness, and premium grade rail products; engineered special-bar-quality products, merchant-bar-quality products, and other engineered round steel bars; channels, angles, flats, merchant rounds, and reinforcing steel bars; and specialty shapes and light structural steel products.