Howard Financial Services LTD. Decreases Holdings in SouthState Co. $SSB

Howard Financial Services LTD. decreased its position in shares of SouthState Co. (NASDAQ:SSB) by 1.1% during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 16,149 shares of the bank’s stock after selling 177 shares during the quarter. Howard Financial Services LTD.’s holdings in SouthState were worth $1,486,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of SSB. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of SouthState by 31.2% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 11,079,578 shares of the bank’s stock worth $1,028,406,000 after acquiring an additional 2,637,786 shares in the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its position in shares of SouthState by 34.3% during the 1st quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 4,556,410 shares of the bank’s stock worth $422,915,000 after purchasing an additional 1,164,348 shares during the last quarter. Westwood Holdings Group Inc. raised its position in shares of SouthState by 2,221.8% during the 4th quarter. Westwood Holdings Group Inc. now owns 727,341 shares of the bank’s stock worth $72,356,000 after purchasing an additional 696,014 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new position in shares of SouthState during the 1st quarter worth approximately $62,230,000. Finally, FJ Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of SouthState by 286.3% during the 1st quarter. FJ Capital Management LLC now owns 556,226 shares of the bank’s stock worth $51,629,000 after purchasing an additional 412,242 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.76% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently issued reports on SSB. Jefferies Financial Group began coverage on SouthState in a research report on Wednesday, May 21st. They set a “buy” rating and a $110.00 price objective for the company. DA Davidson lifted their price objective on SouthState from $115.00 to $117.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, July 28th. Hovde Group lifted their price objective on SouthState from $97.00 to $105.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Citigroup restated a “buy” rating and set a $117.00 price objective (up from $113.00) on shares of SouthState in a research report on Monday, July 28th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on SouthState from $117.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, July 28th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have given a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $115.27.

SouthState Trading Down 0.9%

Shares of SSB opened at $101.31 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $97.81 and a two-hundred day moving average of $92.44. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.07, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a current ratio of 0.91. The company has a market capitalization of $10.25 billion, a PE ratio of 14.56 and a beta of 0.74. SouthState Co. has a fifty-two week low of $77.74 and a fifty-two week high of $114.26.

SouthState (NASDAQ:SSB) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The bank reported $2.30 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.98 by $0.32. The company had revenue of $840.50 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $645.12 million. SouthState had a return on equity of 9.62% and a net margin of 22.38%.During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.74 EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that SouthState Co. will post 8.12 EPS for the current year.

SouthState Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 8th were issued a dividend of $0.60 per share. This represents a $2.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.4%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 8th. This is a positive change from SouthState’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.54. SouthState’s payout ratio is currently 35.77%.

Insider Transactions at SouthState

In other news, Director G Stacy Smith acquired 2,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, August 1st. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $92.30 per share, for a total transaction of $230,750.00. Following the acquisition, the director directly owned 39,546 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,650,095.80. This represents a 6.75% increase in their position. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, Director Janet P. Froetscher acquired 3,338 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 30th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $97.31 per share, with a total value of $324,820.78. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director owned 8,294 shares in the company, valued at approximately $807,089.14. The trade was a 67.35% increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Insiders bought a total of 8,338 shares of company stock worth $786,321 in the last ninety days. Insiders own 1.70% of the company’s stock.

SouthState Profile

SouthState Corporation operates as the bank holding company for SouthState Bank, National Association that provides a range of banking services and products to individuals and companies. It offers checking accounts, savings deposits, interest-bearing transaction accounts, certificates of deposits, money market accounts, and other time deposits, as well as bond accounting, asset/liability consulting related activities, and other clearing and corporate checking account services.