Royce & Associates LP Has $447,000 Holdings in John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (NYSE:WLY)

Key Points

• Royce & Associates LP reduced its stake in John Wiley & Sons by 57.5% during Q1, now holding 10,041 shares valued at approximately $447,000.
• Analysts at Wall Street Zen upgraded John Wiley & Sons from a "buy" to a "strong-buy" rating following positive quarterly earnings results.
• The company recently announced a quarterly dividend increase to $0.355 per share, along with a $250 million stock repurchase program, indicating confidence in its stock valuation.

Royce & Associates LP lowered its stake in shares of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (NYSE:WLY - Free Report) by 57.5% during the first quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 10,041 shares of the company's stock after selling 13,605 shares during the quarter. Royce & Associates LP's holdings in John Wiley & Sons were worth $447,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in WLY. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its position in John Wiley & Sons by 35.8% during the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,564 shares of the company's stock valued at $70,000 after purchasing an additional 412 shares during the period. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS acquired a new stake in shares of John Wiley & Sons in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $361,000. Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its position in shares of John Wiley & Sons by 2.7% in the 1st quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 222,972 shares of the company's stock valued at $9,936,000 after acquiring an additional 5,901 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in shares of John Wiley & Sons by 0.4% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 5,318,812 shares of the company's stock valued at $232,485,000 after acquiring an additional 21,748 shares during the period. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC acquired a new stake in shares of John Wiley & Sons in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $880,000. Institutional investors own 73.94% of the company's stock.

John Wiley & Sons Stock Down 1.0%

Shares of WLY traded down $0.39 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $38.21. 535,942 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 476,160. The company has a market cap of $2.04 billion, a PE ratio of 24.97 and a beta of 0.91. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. has a 52 week low of $36.50 and a 52 week high of $53.96. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $40.90 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.05, a current ratio of 0.54 and a quick ratio of 0.51.

John Wiley & Sons (NYSE:WLY - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, June 17th. The company reported $1.37 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.27 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $442.58 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $435.00 million. John Wiley & Sons had a net margin of 5.02% and a return on equity of 27.42%. The business's quarterly revenue was down 5.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.21 EPS. On average, research analysts forecast that John Wiley & Sons, Inc. will post 3.42 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

John Wiley & Sons declared that its board has authorized a stock repurchase plan on Thursday, June 26th that permits the company to repurchase $250.00 million in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the company to repurchase up to 10.7% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are usually a sign that the company's management believes its shares are undervalued.

John Wiley & Sons Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 24th. Investors of record on Tuesday, July 8th were paid a $0.355 dividend. This is a boost from John Wiley & Sons's previous quarterly dividend of $0.35. This represents a $1.42 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, July 8th. John Wiley & Sons's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 92.81%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, Wall Street Zen raised John Wiley & Sons from a "buy" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Saturday, June 21st.

John Wiley & Sons Company Profile

John Wiley & Sons, Inc engages in the provision of research and learning materials. It operates through the following segments: Research, Learning, and Held for Sale or Sold. The Research segment consists of research publishing and research solutions. The Learning segment includes academic and professional reporting lines and consists of publishing and related knowledge solutions.