Willner & Heller LLC Buys 407 Shares of Bank of America Corporation $BAC

Willner & Heller LLC raised its stake in shares of Bank of America Corporation (NYSE:BAC) by 7.3% in the second quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 5,995 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 407 shares during the period. Willner & Heller LLC’s holdings in Bank of America were worth $284,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Bank of New York Mellon Corp lifted its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 1.3% during the first quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 60,417,407 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $2,521,218,000 after acquiring an additional 803,570 shares during the period. Deutsche Bank AG raised its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 45.1% in the first quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 48,112,090 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $2,007,718,000 after buying an additional 14,960,086 shares during the last quarter. Amundi raised its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 3.7% in the first quarter. Amundi now owns 39,233,293 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,637,205,000 after buying an additional 1,413,313 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 0.6% in the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 31,956,699 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,333,351,000 after buying an additional 188,638 shares during the last quarter. Finally, National Pension Service raised its holdings in shares of Bank of America by 2.4% in the first quarter. National Pension Service now owns 12,970,274 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $541,250,000 after buying an additional 300,944 shares during the last quarter. 70.71% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

BAC has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Citigroup lifted their price target on Bank of America from $54.00 to $58.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 19th. Evercore ISI lifted their price target on Bank of America from $49.00 to $55.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on Bank of America from $56.00 to $60.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 16th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Bank of America from $50.00 to $66.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday. Finally, TD Cowen boosted their price objective on Bank of America from $54.00 to $59.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday. Nineteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $53.38.

Bank of America Price Performance

Shares of BAC opened at $50.63 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.14, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.80. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $49.37 and a 200 day simple moving average of $45.26. Bank of America Corporation has a 52-week low of $33.06 and a 52-week high of $52.88. The firm has a market capitalization of $374.98 billion, a PE ratio of 14.80, a P/E/G ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 1.33.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 16th. The financial services provider reported $0.89 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.86 by $0.03. Bank of America had a return on equity of 10.25% and a net margin of 14.81%.The business had revenue of ($22,273.00) million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $26.79 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.83 EPS. Bank of America’s quarterly revenue was up 4.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that Bank of America Corporation will post 3.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Bank of America Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 26th. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 5th were given a dividend of $0.28 per share. This is an increase from Bank of America’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 5th. This represents a $1.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.2%. Bank of America’s payout ratio is currently 32.75%.

Bank of America announced that its board has approved a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, July 23rd that authorizes the company to repurchase $40.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the financial services provider to reacquire up to 11.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Bank of America news, insider James P. Demare sold 148,391 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $45.57, for a total transaction of $6,762,177.87. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 223,407 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,180,656.99. This represents a 39.91% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. 0.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Bank of America Company Profile

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides banking and financial products and services for individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, large corporations, and governments worldwide. It operates in four segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth & Investment Management (GWIM), Global Banking, and Global Markets.