AZZ Inc. (NYSE:AZZ) Receives $108.00 Consensus Target Price from Analysts

AZZ Inc. (NYSE:AZZ) has been given an average rating of “Moderate Buy” by the nine research firms that are presently covering the firm, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, five have given a buy recommendation and one has given a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 1 year target price among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $108.00.

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on AZZ. Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on AZZ from $90.00 to $110.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, July 11th. Sidoti downgraded AZZ from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $101.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Monday, June 9th. Evercore ISI lifted their target price on AZZ from $90.00 to $108.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 9th. Wall Street Zen raised AZZ from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, July 12th. Finally, Noble Financial reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of AZZ in a report on Monday, July 14th.

Insider Transactions at AZZ

In other news, CEO Thomas E. Ferguson sold 26,889 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, April 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $85.88, for a total value of $2,309,227.32. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 211,458 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $18,160,013.04. The trade was a 11.28% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, COO Bryan Lee Stovall sold 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $107.98, for a total value of $539,900.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer directly owned 27,709 shares in the company, valued at $2,992,017.82. This represents a 15.29% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 77,256 shares of company stock worth $7,483,319 over the last three months. 1.77% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in AZZ. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC bought a new stake in AZZ in the 2nd quarter valued at about $11,701,000. Transcendent Capital Group LLC bought a new stake in AZZ in the 2nd quarter valued at about $592,000. Tectonic Advisors LLC increased its position in AZZ by 61.8% in the 2nd quarter. Tectonic Advisors LLC now owns 10,329 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $976,000 after buying an additional 3,947 shares in the last quarter. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS increased its position in AZZ by 10.3% in the 2nd quarter. KLP Kapitalforvaltning AS now owns 6,400 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $605,000 after buying an additional 600 shares in the last quarter. Finally, QRG Capital Management Inc. bought a new stake in AZZ in the 2nd quarter valued at about $247,000. 90.93% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

AZZ Trading Up 0.4%

Shares of AZZ stock opened at $109.73 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.29 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.72 and a beta of 1.24. AZZ has a twelve month low of $69.59 and a twelve month high of $113.58. The company has a quick ratio of 1.10, a current ratio of 1.51 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.47. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $96.67 and its 200 day simple moving average is $90.88.

AZZ (NYSE:AZZ) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 9th. The industrial products company reported $1.78 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.59 by $0.19. The business had revenue of $421,962 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $435.91 million. AZZ had a return on equity of 15.54% and a net margin of 16.40%. AZZ’s quarterly revenue was up 2.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.46 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that AZZ will post 5.13 EPS for the current fiscal year.

AZZ Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, July 31st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, July 10th will be paid a $0.20 dividend. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.73%. This is an increase from AZZ’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.17. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, July 10th. AZZ’s payout ratio is currently 9.27%.

About AZZ

AZZ Inc provides hot-dip galvanizing and coil coating solutions in North America. It offers metal finishing solutions for corrosion protection, including hot-dip galvanizing, spin galvanizing, powder coating, anodizing, and plating to steel fabrication and other industries, as well as to fabricators or manufacturers that provide services to the transmission and distribution, bridge and highway, petrochemical, and general industrial markets; and original equipment manufacturers.