Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC Has $3.30 Million Stock Holdings in Smurfit Westrock PLC $SW

Key Points

• Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC significantly increased its position in Smurfit Westrock PLC by 1,010.9%, owning 73,120 shares valued at $3,295,000 after purchasing an additional 66,538 shares in the first quarter.
• Smurfit Westrock recently reported a quarterly earnings per share (EPS) of $0.45, falling short of estimates by $0.12, despite a revenue increase of 167.4% year-over-year.
• The company declared a quarterly dividend of $0.4308, with a high payout ratio of 260.61%, signifying a yield of 4.1% for investors.

Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC grew its position in Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW - Free Report) by 1,010.9% in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 73,120 shares of the company's stock after buying an additional 66,538 shares during the period. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC's holdings in Smurfit Westrock were worth $3,295,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. NBC Securities Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 127,600.0% in the 1st quarter. NBC Securities Inc. now owns 1,277 shares of the company's stock valued at $57,000 after buying an additional 1,276 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 1.7% in the 4th quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 9,003,480 shares of the company's stock valued at $484,927,000 after buying an additional 149,210 shares during the period. QRG Capital Management Inc. lifted its position in Smurfit Westrock by 106.3% in the 1st quarter. QRG Capital Management Inc. now owns 11,709 shares of the company's stock valued at $528,000 after acquiring an additional 6,032 shares in the last quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue lifted its position in Smurfit Westrock by 2.8% in the 1st quarter. State of Alaska Department of Revenue now owns 57,939 shares of the company's stock valued at $2,610,000 after acquiring an additional 1,600 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Farther Finance Advisors LLC lifted its position in Smurfit Westrock by 36.5% in the 1st quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 5,038 shares of the company's stock valued at $230,000 after acquiring an additional 1,346 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 83.38% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts recently commented on SW shares. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $45.00 to $46.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research report on Thursday, July 31st. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $51.00 to $53.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 8th. Truist Financial boosted their price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $50.00 to $54.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, July 11th. Jefferies Financial Group raised shares of Smurfit Westrock from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $44.00 to $55.00 in a research report on Monday, June 16th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada cut their price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $57.00 to $56.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $57.78.

Smurfit Westrock Stock Up 4.6%

NYSE:SW traded up $1.9970 on Friday, hitting $45.6870. 4,850,915 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,298,755. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $44.99 and a 200-day moving average price of $45.17. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a current ratio of 1.45 and a quick ratio of 0.95. Smurfit Westrock PLC has a 52 week low of $37.01 and a 52 week high of $56.99. The company has a market cap of $23.85 billion, a P/E ratio of 69.22 and a beta of 1.06.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 30th. The company reported $0.45 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.57 by ($0.12). Smurfit Westrock had a return on equity of 5.90% and a net margin of 1.14%.The business had revenue of $7.94 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.88 billion. Smurfit Westrock's revenue was up 167.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that Smurfit Westrock PLC will post 3.25 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Smurfit Westrock Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 15th will be paid a dividend of $0.4308 per share. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.8%. Smurfit Westrock's dividend payout ratio is presently 260.61%.

About Smurfit Westrock

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.