Quest Diagnostics Incorporated $DGX Shares Sold by Winnow Wealth LLC

Winnow Wealth LLC lowered its holdings in Quest Diagnostics Incorporated (NYSE:DGX) by 85.1% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 944 shares of the medical research company’s stock after selling 5,385 shares during the period. Winnow Wealth LLC’s holdings in Quest Diagnostics were worth $164,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in DGX. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in Quest Diagnostics by 1.0% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 14,392,082 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $2,497,458,000 after buying an additional 140,450 shares during the period. State Street Corp grew its holdings in Quest Diagnostics by 0.8% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 5,223,930 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $995,577,000 after buying an additional 38,931 shares during the period. Boston Partners increased its stake in shares of Quest Diagnostics by 32.8% during the 3rd quarter. Boston Partners now owns 4,036,881 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $767,978,000 after acquiring an additional 997,033 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its stake in shares of Quest Diagnostics by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,907,510 shares of the medical research company’s stock valued at $363,509,000 after acquiring an additional 6,155 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Invesco Ltd. lifted its holdings in shares of Quest Diagnostics by 1.8% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 1,688,769 shares of the medical research company’s stock worth $321,846,000 after acquiring an additional 30,418 shares during the period. 88.06% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

DGX has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Quest Diagnostics from $210.00 to $220.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 22nd. Mizuho increased their price target on shares of Quest Diagnostics from $210.00 to $235.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 12th. Evercore set a $225.00 price target on shares of Quest Diagnostics in a report on Tuesday, April 21st. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Quest Diagnostics from a “buy (b+)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 19th. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded Quest Diagnostics from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, May 30th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $216.58.

Quest Diagnostics Stock Down 1.6%

Shares of Quest Diagnostics stock opened at $197.07 on Tuesday. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $194.42 and a 200 day moving average price of $191.45. The company has a current ratio of 1.18, a quick ratio of 1.08 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.67. Quest Diagnostics Incorporated has a twelve month low of $164.65 and a twelve month high of $213.50. The stock has a market cap of $21.82 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.78, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.39 and a beta of 0.59.

Quest Diagnostics (NYSE:DGX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 21st. The medical research company reported $2.50 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.37 by $0.13. The company had revenue of $2.90 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.83 billion. Quest Diagnostics had a return on equity of 15.60% and a net margin of 9.07%.The firm’s revenue was up 9.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.94 earnings per share. Quest Diagnostics has set its FY 2026 guidance at 10.630-10.830 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that Quest Diagnostics Incorporated will post 10.72 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Quest Diagnostics Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 22nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, July 8th will be paid a dividend of $0.86 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, July 8th. This represents a $3.44 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.7%. Quest Diagnostics’s payout ratio is 38.01%.

Quest Diagnostics declared that its board has approved a stock buyback plan on Tuesday, February 10th that allows the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the medical research company to repurchase up to 4.7% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Quest Diagnostics news, CEO J. E. Davis sold 10,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $194.14, for a total value of $1,941,400.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 132,423 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $25,708,601.22. This represents a 7.02% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, SVP Karthik Kuppusamy sold 8,147 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $200.00, for a total value of $1,629,400.00. Following the sale, the senior vice president owned 13,510 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,702,000. This represents a 37.62% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders own 0.88% of the company’s stock.

Quest Diagnostics Profile

Quest Diagnostics (NYSE: DGX) is a leading provider of diagnostic information services that supports clinical decision-making for patients, physicians and healthcare organizations. The company operates a network of clinical laboratories and patient service centers that perform a broad range of laboratory tests and diagnostic assays used in routine care, disease diagnosis, monitoring and screening.

Its services span core clinical laboratory testing, anatomic pathology, molecular and genomic diagnostics, infectious disease testing and toxicology.