Mufg Securities Americas Inc. Acquires Shares of 2,346 Bio-Techne Co. (NASDAQ:TECH)

Mufg Securities Americas Inc. acquired a new stake in Bio-Techne Co. (NASDAQ:TECH) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 2,346 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock, valued at approximately $169,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Bio-Techne by 1.5% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 18,594,608 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $1,339,370,000 after acquiring an additional 275,644 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its position in shares of Bio-Techne by 13.1% during the 4th quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,654,267 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $767,428,000 after acquiring an additional 1,229,954 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. lifted its position in shares of Bio-Techne by 7.2% during the 4th quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 4,702,942 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $338,756,000 after acquiring an additional 317,349 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its position in shares of Bio-Techne by 2.5% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 4,001,296 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $287,488,000 after acquiring an additional 98,660 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Bio-Techne by 10.4% during the 4th quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,820,464 shares of the biotechnology company’s stock valued at $275,188,000 after acquiring an additional 358,756 shares during the period. 98.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on TECH. Baird R W downgraded shares of Bio-Techne from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 19th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on Bio-Techne from $75.00 to $60.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 8th. Royal Bank of Canada cut their price objective on Bio-Techne from $72.00 to $63.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 8th. Robert W. Baird downgraded Bio-Techne from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $88.00 to $68.00 in a research report on Wednesday, February 19th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Bio-Techne from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Bio-Techne has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $73.44.

Bio-Techne Trading Up 1.9%

Shares of TECH opened at $49.15 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $53.46 and a two-hundred day moving average of $65.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14, a quick ratio of 2.77 and a current ratio of 3.94. The company has a market capitalization of $7.71 billion, a PE ratio of 49.65, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.88 and a beta of 1.46. Bio-Techne Co. has a fifty-two week low of $46.01 and a fifty-two week high of $84.22.

Bio-Techne (NASDAQ:TECH) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 7th. The biotechnology company reported $0.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.51 by $0.05. Bio-Techne had a net margin of 13.22% and a return on equity of 12.73%. The company had revenue of $316.18 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $317.92 million. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $0.48 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 4.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that Bio-Techne Co. will post 1.67 EPS for the current year.

Bio-Techne announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, May 7th that authorizes the company to buyback $500.00 million in shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the biotechnology company to purchase up to 6.5% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s leadership believes its shares are undervalued.

Bio-Techne Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 30th. Stockholders of record on Monday, May 19th will be paid a dividend of $0.08 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, May 19th. This represents a $0.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.65%. Bio-Techne’s dividend payout ratio is presently 39.02%.

Bio-Techne Profile

Bio-Techne Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, develops, manufactures, and sells life science reagents, instruments, and services for the research and clinical diagnostic markets in the United States, the United Kingdom, rest of Europe, Middle East, and Africa, Greater China, rest of Asia-Pacific, and internationally.