Stratos Wealth Partners LTD. Reduces Stock Position in Seagate Technology Holdings PLC (NASDAQ:STX)

Stratos Wealth Partners LTD. lessened its holdings in shares of Seagate Technology Holdings PLC (NASDAQ:STX - Free Report) by 29.2% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 4,173 shares of the data storage provider's stock after selling 1,722 shares during the quarter. Stratos Wealth Partners LTD.'s holdings in Seagate Technology were worth $355,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in STX. Johnson Financial Group Inc. increased its stake in Seagate Technology by 22.7% during the fourth quarter. Johnson Financial Group Inc. now owns 606 shares of the data storage provider's stock worth $52,000 after purchasing an additional 112 shares during the period. Signaturefd LLC increased its stake in Seagate Technology by 2.3% during the fourth quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 4,988 shares of the data storage provider's stock worth $431,000 after purchasing an additional 113 shares during the period. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Seagate Technology by 2.6% during the fourth quarter. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 4,835 shares of the data storage provider's stock worth $417,000 after buying an additional 123 shares during the period. Level Four Advisory Services LLC increased its stake in shares of Seagate Technology by 4.1% during the fourth quarter. Level Four Advisory Services LLC now owns 3,343 shares of the data storage provider's stock worth $289,000 after buying an additional 131 shares during the period. Finally, B. Riley Wealth Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Seagate Technology by 0.9% during the fourth quarter. B. Riley Wealth Advisors Inc. now owns 15,247 shares of the data storage provider's stock worth $1,327,000 after buying an additional 134 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.87% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

STX has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Seagate Technology from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Friday, May 30th. Cantor Fitzgerald upped their target price on shares of Seagate Technology from $110.00 to $125.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Monday, May 19th. Mizuho cut their target price on shares of Seagate Technology from $115.00 to $95.00 and set an "outperform" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, April 10th. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Seagate Technology from $80.00 to $85.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 30th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group initiated coverage on shares of Seagate Technology in a research note on Thursday, July 10th. They set a "buy" rating and a $170.00 target price on the stock. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $128.00.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Ban Seng Teh sold 1,725 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $144.00, for a total value of $248,400.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president directly owned 12,052 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,735,488. This represents a 12.52% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, Director Stephanie Tilenius sold 2,693 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, June 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $128.04, for a total value of $344,811.72. Following the sale, the director directly owned 12,244 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,567,721.76. This represents a 18.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 395,516 shares of company stock valued at $47,831,398. 0.81% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Seagate Technology Price Performance

Shares of STX stock traded down $1.93 during trading hours on Wednesday, hitting $147.12. The stock had a trading volume of 2,694,257 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,245,776. The firm has a market capitalization of $31.22 billion, a PE ratio of 21.26 and a beta of 1.45. Seagate Technology Holdings PLC has a twelve month low of $63.19 and a twelve month high of $152.16. The stock's 50 day moving average is $126.27 and its 200 day moving average is $102.20.

Seagate Technology (NASDAQ:STX - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 29th. The data storage provider reported $1.90 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.75 by $0.15. The business had revenue of $2.16 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.14 billion. Seagate Technology had a negative return on equity of 105.02% and a net margin of 17.49%. The company's revenue was up 30.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.33 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that Seagate Technology Holdings PLC will post 6.83 earnings per share for the current year.

Seagate Technology Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, July 8th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, June 25th were issued a $0.72 dividend. This represents a $2.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.96%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, June 25th. Seagate Technology's payout ratio is currently 41.62%.

Seagate Technology declared that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase plan on Thursday, May 22nd that permits the company to repurchase $5.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the data storage provider to reacquire up to 21.6% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are usually an indication that the company's leadership believes its stock is undervalued.

About Seagate Technology

Seagate Technology Holdings plc provides data storage technology and solutions in Singapore, the United States, the Netherlands, and internationally. It provides mass capacity storage products, including enterprise nearline hard disk drives (HDDs), enterprise nearline solid state drives (SSDs), enterprise nearline systems, video and image HDDs, and network-attached storage drives.