Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW) Receives $58.00 Average Price Target from Brokerages

Key Points

• Smurfit Westrock PLC has received a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" from ten brokerages, with nine analysts assigning a buy recommendation and one a hold.
• The company announced a quarterly dividend of $0.4308 per share, representing an annualized yield of 3.9%.
• Despite missing quarterly earnings estimates with an EPS of $0.45, Smurfit Westrock reported a significant revenue increase of 167.4% year-over-year, totaling $7.94 billion.

Shares of Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW - Get Free Report) have received an average rating of "Moderate Buy" from the ten research firms that are covering the firm, MarketBeat Ratings reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company. The average 1 year price objective among analysts that have covered the stock in the last year is $58.00.

SW has been the subject of several recent research reports. Royal Bank Of Canada lowered their price target on Smurfit Westrock from $57.00 to $56.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. Jefferies Financial Group raised shares of Smurfit Westrock from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $44.00 to $55.00 in a research note on Monday, June 16th. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $51.00 to $53.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 8th. Truist Financial raised their target price on Smurfit Westrock from $50.00 to $54.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Friday, July 11th. Finally, Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $64.00 to $63.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, June 30th.

Institutional Trading of Smurfit Westrock

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 0.4% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 79,187,333 shares of the company's stock worth $3,564,678,000 after purchasing an additional 316,074 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in Smurfit Westrock in the 1st quarter worth about $1,051,299,000. Nuveen Asset Management LLC increased its stake in Smurfit Westrock by 51.6% in the 4th quarter. Nuveen Asset Management LLC now owns 20,720,312 shares of the company's stock valued at $1,115,996,000 after buying an additional 7,050,781 shares during the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its position in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 1.8% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 18,439,852 shares of the company's stock worth $993,170,000 after buying an additional 318,806 shares in the last quarter. Finally, FIL Ltd boosted its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 68.2% in the 4th quarter. FIL Ltd now owns 10,962,433 shares of the company's stock worth $590,853,000 after buying an additional 4,444,704 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 83.38% of the company's stock.

Smurfit Westrock Stock Performance

NYSE:SW traded up $1.13 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $43.76. 2,170,454 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 3,703,708. The firm has a market capitalization of $22.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 66.22 and a beta of 1.06. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $44.87 and a 200 day moving average price of $46.11. Smurfit Westrock has a twelve month low of $37.01 and a twelve month high of $56.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a current ratio of 1.45 and a quick ratio of 0.95.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 30th. The company reported $0.45 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.57 by ($0.12). The business had revenue of $7.94 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.88 billion. Smurfit Westrock had a return on equity of 5.90% and a net margin of 1.14%. The company's revenue was up 167.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts expect that Smurfit Westrock will post 3.25 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Smurfit Westrock Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 18th. Investors of record on Friday, August 15th will be paid a $0.4308 dividend. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.9%. Smurfit Westrock's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 260.61%.

Smurfit Westrock Company Profile

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.