Insider Selling: Noble (NYSE:NE) SVP Sells $809,185.00 in Stock

Key Points

• Caroline Alting, Noble’s senior vice president, sold 15,340 shares on April 28 at an average of $52.75 for a total of $809,185, reducing her direct ownership by 65.25% to 8,170 shares (valued at about $430,968).
• Noble beat the quarter’s estimates with EPS of $0.26 (vs. $0.21) and revenue of $785.7M (vs. $730.8M) despite a 10.1% YoY revenue decline, and declared a $0.50 quarterly dividend ($2.00 annualized, yield 3.9%) with a payout ratio of 139.86%.

Noble Corporation PLC (NYSE:NE - Get Free Report) SVP Caroline Alting sold 15,340 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $52.75, for a total transaction of $809,185.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president directly owned 8,170 shares of the company's stock, valued at $430,967.50. This represents a 65.25% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website.

Caroline Alting also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Friday, February 13th, Caroline Alting sold 4,195 shares of Noble stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $43.60, for a total value of $182,902.00.

Noble Stock Performance

NYSE NE traded up $0.89 on Thursday, hitting $51.19. 2,223,660 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,016,286. The firm has a market cap of $8.17 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.80 and a beta of 1.00. The firm's 50-day moving average price is $47.82 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $37.50. Noble Corporation PLC has a fifty-two week low of $21.75 and a fifty-two week high of $54.57. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 1.67 and a quick ratio of 1.67.

Noble (NYSE:NE - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, April 27th. The company reported $0.26 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.21 by $0.05. Noble had a return on equity of 2.32% and a net margin of 7.17%.The business had revenue of $785.69 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $730.80 million. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.26 EPS. The company's quarterly revenue was down 10.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts expect that Noble Corporation PLC will post 1.06 EPS for the current year.

Noble Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 25th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 4th will be issued a $0.50 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, June 4th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.9%. Noble's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 139.86%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts have commented on NE shares. Evercore set a $59.00 target price on Noble in a report on Monday. BTIG Research upped their target price on shares of Noble from $35.00 to $42.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of Noble from $33.00 to $41.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 17th. Fearnley Fonds lowered Noble from a "strong-buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 11th. Finally, Zacks Research cut Noble from a "hold" rating to a "strong sell" rating in a report on Monday, April 20th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, nine have given a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of "Reduce" and a consensus target price of $44.38.

Institutional Trading of Noble

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Westside Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Noble by 156.4% in the third quarter. Westside Investment Management Inc. now owns 864 shares of the company's stock valued at $25,000 after purchasing an additional 527 shares in the last quarter. Salomon & Ludwin LLC purchased a new stake in Noble in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $40,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its holdings in Noble by 77.8% during the 4th quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,440 shares of the company's stock valued at $41,000 after buying an additional 630 shares during the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Noble by 819.1% during the 2nd quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,601 shares of the company's stock valued at $69,000 after buying an additional 2,318 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Janney Montgomery Scott LLC acquired a new stake in Noble during the 1st quarter valued at $218,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 68.14% of the company's stock.

About Noble

Noble NYSE: NE is an offshore drilling company that provides drilling services to the global oil and gas industry. The firm operates a fleet of mobile offshore drilling units and delivers contract drilling solutions for exploration and production activities. Its core business centers on executing drilling programs for upstream energy companies across a range of water depths and operating environments.

Products and services include the operation and management of offshore drilling rigs — such as drillships, semisubmersibles and jackups — along with associated technical, engineering and project management services.

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