Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. Takes Position in Gildan Activewear Inc. (NYSE:GIL)

Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. purchased a new position in Gildan Activewear Inc. (NYSE:GIL - Free Report) TSE: GIL in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm purchased 1,042,215 shares of the textile maker's stock, valued at approximately $34,456,000. Vaughan Nelson Investment Management L.P. owned about 0.61% of Gildan Activewear at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Pzena Investment Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Gildan Activewear by 1.6% during the third quarter. Pzena Investment Management LLC now owns 10,996,538 shares of the textile maker's stock worth $308,013,000 after purchasing an additional 168,601 shares during the last quarter. Coliseum Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Gildan Activewear by 23.9% during the second quarter. Coliseum Capital Management LLC now owns 10,662,735 shares of the textile maker's stock worth $343,767,000 after purchasing an additional 2,060,229 shares during the last quarter. Browning West LP raised its holdings in shares of Gildan Activewear by 3.9% during the second quarter. Browning West LP now owns 6,645,548 shares of the textile maker's stock worth $214,252,000 after purchasing an additional 250,000 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Gildan Activewear by 1.6% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 6,401,045 shares of the textile maker's stock worth $179,293,000 after purchasing an additional 97,924 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Cardinal Capital Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Gildan Activewear by 2.5% during the third quarter. Cardinal Capital Management Inc. now owns 2,884,333 shares of the textile maker's stock worth $81,092,000 after purchasing an additional 69,563 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.83% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

GIL has been the topic of several analyst reports. Citigroup raised their price target on shares of Gildan Activewear from $40.00 to $44.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Friday, February 23rd. Stifel Canada lowered shares of Gildan Activewear from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Monday, December 18th. Stifel Nicolaus raised their price target on shares of Gildan Activewear from $34.00 to $36.00 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a research report on Thursday, February 22nd. Scotiabank raised their price target on shares of Gildan Activewear from $39.50 to $40.50 and gave the company a "sector outperform" rating in a research report on Friday, February 9th. Finally, UBS Group lowered shares of Gildan Activewear from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and dropped their price target for the company from $40.00 to $37.00 in a research report on Friday, January 5th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $41.05.

Gildan Activewear Price Performance

Shares of NYSE GIL traded up $0.15 during trading on Friday, hitting $36.18. The company had a trading volume of 413,641 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,079,745. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $35.04 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $33.03. Gildan Activewear Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $26.98 and a fifty-two week high of $38.87. The firm has a market capitalization of $6.10 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 11.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.37 and a beta of 1.38. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 2.33 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39.

Gildan Activewear (NYSE:GIL - Get Free Report) TSE: GIL last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 21st. The textile maker reported $0.75 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.72 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $782.70 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $753.35 million. Gildan Activewear had a net margin of 16.70% and a return on equity of 23.19%. Gildan Activewear's quarterly revenue was up 8.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.65 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that Gildan Activewear Inc. will post 2.94 earnings per share for the current year.

Gildan Activewear Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 8th. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 13th will be given a dividend of $0.205 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, March 12th. This is a positive change from Gildan Activewear's previous quarterly dividend of $0.19. This represents a $0.82 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.27%. Gildan Activewear's payout ratio is presently 27.06%.

Gildan Activewear Company Profile

Gildan Activewear Inc manufactures and sells various apparel products in the United States, North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America. It provides various activewear products, including T-shirts, fleece tops and bottoms, and sports shirts under the Gildan, Gildan Performance, Gildan Hammer, Glidan Softstyle, Gildan Heavy Cotton, Gildan Ultra Cotton, Gildan DryBlend, Gildan HeavyBlend, Comfort Colors, and American Apparel brands.