First Citizens Bank & Trust Co. Purchases Shares of 27,848 Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

First Citizens Bank & Trust Co. bought a new position in shares of Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) during the first quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm bought 27,848 shares of the basic materials company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,581,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of CE. Dodge & Cox grew its position in Celanese by 100.3% in the 4th quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 13,618,062 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $942,506,000 after buying an additional 6,818,993 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Celanese in the 4th quarter valued at $222,815,000. Turtle Creek Asset Management Inc. grew its position in Celanese by 266.7% in the 4th quarter. Turtle Creek Asset Management Inc. now owns 3,506,440 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $242,681,000 after buying an additional 2,550,334 shares during the last quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. grew its position in Celanese by 4,506.7% in the 4th quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 2,344,661 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $162,274,000 after buying an additional 2,293,764 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Invesco Ltd. grew its position in Celanese by 105.0% in the 4th quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,969,284 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $274,714,000 after buying an additional 2,033,025 shares during the last quarter. 98.87% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Celanese Trading Up 2.7%

NYSE:CE opened at $56.98 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $6.23 billion, a PE ratio of -4.09, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.05 and a beta of 1.13. The company has a quick ratio of 0.76, a current ratio of 1.34 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.98. Celanese Co. has a 52-week low of $36.29 and a 52-week high of $150.31. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $47.37 and a 200-day simple moving average of $58.73.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last announced its earnings results on Monday, May 5th. The basic materials company reported $0.57 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.37 by $0.20. Celanese had a negative net margin of 14.81% and a positive return on equity of 12.86%. The firm had revenue of $2.39 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.26 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $2.08 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 8.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts expect that Celanese Co. will post 8.79 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, May 12th. Investors of record on Monday, April 28th were paid a $0.03 dividend. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.21%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, April 28th. Celanese’s payout ratio is -0.79%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CE has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of Celanese from $59.00 to $62.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 14th. BMO Capital Markets raised Celanese from an “underperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and raised their target price for the company from $46.00 to $55.00 in a report on Tuesday, May 20th. KeyCorp raised their target price on Celanese from $71.00 to $76.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 7th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on Celanese from $70.00 to $75.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, March 27th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their target price on Celanese from $92.00 to $54.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 20th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have issued a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $61.94.

Insider Activity at Celanese

In other news, SVP Mark Christopher Murray bought 1,479 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 23rd. The stock was purchased at an average price of $52.18 per share, with a total value of $77,174.22. Following the purchase, the senior vice president now owns 15,468 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $807,120.24. This trade represents a 10.57% increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. 0.33% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Celanese Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.