AQR Arbitrage LLC Purchases 3,641 Shares of Global Payments Inc. (NYSE:GPN)

AQR Arbitrage LLC lifted its position in shares of Global Payments Inc. (NYSE:GPN) by 9.8% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 40,763 shares of the business services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 3,641 shares during the quarter. AQR Arbitrage LLC’s holdings in Global Payments were worth $4,560,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Boyar Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Global Payments by 6.8% in the fourth quarter. Boyar Asset Management Inc. now owns 8,896 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $997,000 after buying an additional 567 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Global Payments by 23.6% during the fourth quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,374,285 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $153,741,000 after buying an additional 262,521 shares during the period. Global Frontier Investments LLC bought a new position in Global Payments during the fourth quarter worth $7,620,000. Northern Trust Corp lifted its holdings in Global Payments by 12.6% in the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 2,730,471 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $305,977,000 after buying an additional 305,987 shares during the period. Finally, Optiver Holding B.V. bought a new stake in Global Payments during the fourth quarter valued at $28,000. 89.76% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

GPN has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Robert W. Baird dropped their price objective on Global Payments from $145.00 to $100.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, April 21st. Wolfe Research reaffirmed a “peer perform” rating on shares of Global Payments in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. KeyCorp lowered their target price on Global Payments from $145.00 to $80.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Cowen cut shares of Global Payments from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday, April 21st. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered Global Payments from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and lowered their price target for the company from $135.00 to $78.00 in a research report on Thursday, April 17th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eighteen have assigned a hold rating and ten have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $112.86.

Global Payments Stock Down 0.3 %

Shares of NYSE:GPN opened at $76.38 on Thursday. Global Payments Inc. has a 1 year low of $65.93 and a 1 year high of $122.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.66, a current ratio of 0.97 and a quick ratio of 0.93. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $90.21 and its 200 day moving average is $103.44. The company has a market cap of $18.78 billion, a PE ratio of 12.36, a P/E/G ratio of 0.86 and a beta of 0.97.

Global Payments (NYSE:GPN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The business services provider reported $2.84 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.98 by ($0.14). Global Payments had a return on equity of 12.21% and a net margin of 15.54%. The company had revenue of $2.29 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.31 billion. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Global Payments Inc. will post 11.89 EPS for the current year.

Global Payments Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 28th. Investors of record on Friday, March 14th were paid a $0.25 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, March 14th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.31%. Global Payments’s payout ratio is 16.18%.

Global Payments Company Profile

Global Payments Inc provides payment technology and software solutions for card, check, and digital-based payments in the Americas, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific. It operates through two segments, Merchant Solutions and Issuer Solutions. The Merchant Solutions segment offers authorization, settlement and funding, customer support, chargeback resolution, terminal rental, sales and deployment, payment security, and consolidated billing and reporting services.