RWA Wealth Partners LLC Sells 2,532 Shares of Blackstone Inc. $BX

Key Points

• RWA Wealth Partners LLC reduced its holdings in Blackstone Inc. by 18.5% in the first quarter, now owning 11,169 shares worth approximately $1,561,000.
• Several analysts have raised their price targets for Blackstone, with Barclays and Piper Sandler setting new targets at $181, indicating a positive outlook for the stock.
• Blackstone recently increased its quarterly dividend from $0.93 to $1.03 per share, representing an annual yield of 2.5%, which reflects the company's strong revenue growth in the quarter.

RWA Wealth Partners LLC cut its stake in shares of Blackstone Inc. (NYSE:BX - Free Report) by 18.5% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 11,169 shares of the asset manager's stock after selling 2,532 shares during the quarter. RWA Wealth Partners LLC's holdings in Blackstone were worth $1,561,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in Blackstone by 1.6% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 67,997,581 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $9,504,702,000 after buying an additional 1,102,949 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp lifted its stake in shares of Blackstone by 10.8% in the 4th quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 7,016,046 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $1,209,707,000 after purchasing an additional 681,512 shares during the period. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Blackstone by 16.3% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 5,292,320 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $739,761,000 after purchasing an additional 742,829 shares during the period. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main lifted its stake in shares of Blackstone by 2.9% in the 4th quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 5,195,551 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $895,817,000 after purchasing an additional 144,926 shares during the period. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Blackstone by 2.9% in the 1st quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 4,162,867 shares of the asset manager's stock valued at $581,886,000 after purchasing an additional 117,724 shares during the period. 70.00% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on BX. Evercore ISI boosted their price objective on Blackstone from $165.00 to $197.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Friday, July 25th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on Blackstone from $153.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Friday, July 11th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their target price on Blackstone from $168.00 to $180.00 and gave the company a "market perform" rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Dbs Bank raised Blackstone to a "moderate buy" rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 12th. Finally, Piper Sandler boosted their target price on Blackstone from $157.00 to $181.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a research report on Monday, July 28th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Blackstone presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $170.12.

Blackstone Stock Up 4.2%

BX traded up $6.8030 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $170.2430. 5,187,162 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 3,648,507. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a quick ratio of 0.74 and a current ratio of 0.74. The company's fifty day moving average price is $161.69 and its 200 day moving average price is $149.76. The company has a market cap of $125.48 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 45.76, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 1.71. Blackstone Inc. has a one year low of $115.66 and a one year high of $200.96.

Blackstone (NYSE:BX - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 24th. The asset manager reported $1.21 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $1.10 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $3.07 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.77 billion. Blackstone had a return on equity of 20.47% and a net margin of 20.83%.The company's revenue for the quarter was up 32.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.98 EPS. As a group, analysts expect that Blackstone Inc. will post 5.87 EPS for the current year.

Blackstone Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 11th. Shareholders of record on Monday, August 4th were issued a dividend of $1.03 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, August 4th. This represents a $4.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.4%. This is an increase from Blackstone's previous quarterly dividend of $0.93. Blackstone's dividend payout ratio is presently 110.75%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Blackstone news, major shareholder Holdings I. L.P. Blackstone bought 1,189,532 shares of Blackstone stock in a transaction dated Friday, July 18th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $25.22 per share, with a total value of $29,999,997.04. Following the completion of the acquisition, the insider directly owned 4,178,771 shares in the company, valued at approximately $105,388,604.62. The trade was a 39.79% increase in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, Director Joseph Baratta sold 100,000 shares of the company's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $167.36, for a total value of $16,736,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 808,757 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $135,353,571.52. This represents a 11.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders purchased 1,189,806 shares of company stock valued at $30,046,627 and sold 16,850,134 shares valued at $131,641,986. Insiders own 1.00% of the company's stock.

Blackstone Profile

Blackstone Inc is an alternative asset management firm specializing in real estate, private equity, hedge fund solutions, credit, secondary funds of funds, public debt and equity and multi-asset class strategies. The firm typically invests in early-stage companies. It also provide capital markets services.