CSX Co. (NASDAQ:CSX) Given Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Shares of CSX Co. (NASDAQ:CSX) have earned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the sixteen analysts that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat.com reports. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and twelve have given a buy recommendation to the company. The average twelve-month target price among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $38.00.

Several brokerages have recently issued reports on CSX. Jefferies Financial Group reduced their price target on CSX from $40.00 to $38.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, April 18th. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on CSX from $37.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, April 12th. TD Cowen boosted their target price on CSX from $32.00 to $36.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Thursday, January 25th. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their target price on CSX from $37.00 to $36.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, April 18th. Finally, Raymond James boosted their target price on CSX from $35.00 to $38.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 16th.

Institutional Trading of CSX

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of CSX. Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of CSX during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $757,276,000. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its position in CSX by 18.1% in the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 64,807,961 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $2,246,893,000 after acquiring an additional 9,914,656 shares during the period. Capital International Investors grew its position in CSX by 14.3% in the fourth quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 40,353,078 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $1,399,104,000 after acquiring an additional 5,041,679 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its position in CSX by 416.8% in the third quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 5,070,296 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $155,912,000 after acquiring an additional 4,089,150 shares during the period. Finally, Lazard Asset Management LLC grew its position in CSX by 10.4% in the third quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC now owns 29,191,044 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $897,624,000 after acquiring an additional 2,748,738 shares during the period. 73.57% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

CSX Trading Down 0.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ CSX opened at $33.99 on Friday. CSX has a one year low of $29.03 and a one year high of $40.12. The firm has a market capitalization of $66.45 billion, a PE ratio of 18.68, a PEG ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 1.18. The company has a current ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.42. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $36.61 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $34.47.

CSX (NASDAQ:CSX) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 17th. The transportation company reported $0.46 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $3.68 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.66 billion. CSX had a return on equity of 29.58% and a net margin of 24.75%. The firm’s revenue was down .8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.48 EPS. As a group, analysts predict that CSX will post 1.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

CSX Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 29th were given a dividend of $0.12 per share. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, February 28th. This is a boost from CSX’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.11. This represents a $0.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.41%. CSX’s payout ratio is currently 26.37%.

CSX Company Profile

CSX Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides rail-based freight transportation services. The company offers rail services; and transportation of intermodal containers and trailers, as well as other transportation services, such as rail-to-truck transfers and bulk commodity operations. It also transports chemicals, agricultural and food products, minerals, automotive, forest products, fertilizers, and metals and equipment; and coal, coke, and iron ore to electricity-generating power plants, steel manufacturers, and industrial plants, as well as exports coal to deep-water port facilities.