Archer Investment Corp Buys 970 Shares of Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS)

Archer Investment Corp boosted its stake in Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS) by 307.9% in the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 1,285 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after purchasing an additional 970 shares during the quarter. Archer Investment Corp’s holdings in Reliance were worth $372,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in RS. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Reliance by 8.9% in the first quarter. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. now owns 988 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $330,000 after acquiring an additional 81 shares in the last quarter. Empowered Funds LLC acquired a new position in shares of Reliance during the first quarter worth about $421,000. SG Americas Securities LLC lifted its position in shares of Reliance by 98.8% in the first quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 2,368 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $791,000 after buying an additional 1,177 shares during the last quarter. Sei Investments Co. lifted its position in shares of Reliance by 13.1% in the first quarter. Sei Investments Co. now owns 51,053 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $17,062,000 after buying an additional 5,902 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Headlands Technologies LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Reliance in the first quarter valued at approximately $86,000. Institutional investors own 79.26% of the company’s stock.

Reliance Trading Up 1.0 %

Shares of RS stock traded up $3.24 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $313.21. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 8,162 shares, compared to its average volume of 319,278. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $290.57 and its 200-day simple moving average is $289.83. Reliance, Inc. has a 52 week low of $261.77 and a 52 week high of $342.20. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a quick ratio of 1.58 and a current ratio of 3.31. The company has a market cap of $16.95 billion, a PE ratio of 17.03 and a beta of 0.85.

Reliance (NYSE:RS) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 24th. The industrial products company reported $3.64 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.66 by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $3.42 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.38 billion. Reliance had a return on equity of 13.68% and a net margin of 7.42%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $5.00 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Reliance, Inc. will post 16.45 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Reliance Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 6th. Investors of record on Friday, November 22nd will be paid a $1.10 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 22nd. This represents a $4.40 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.40%. Reliance’s payout ratio is 24.16%.

Insider Activity at Reliance

In other news, SVP William A. Smith II sold 6,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $321.71, for a total value of $2,091,115.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 16,849 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,420,491.79. This represents a 27.84 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, Director Mark V. Kaminski sold 5,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, October 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $298.01, for a total transaction of $1,490,050.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 17,832 shares of company stock worth $5,595,881. Insiders own 0.69% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

RS has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. KeyCorp lowered their target price on Reliance from $335.00 to $325.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, October 14th. BMO Capital Markets lowered their price objective on Reliance from $340.00 to $330.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Wolfe Research lowered Reliance from a “peer perform” rating to an “underperform” rating and set a $262.00 price objective on the stock. in a research note on Friday, July 26th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $326.40.

Reliance Profile

Reliance, Inc operates as a diversified metal solutions provider and the metals service center company in the United States, Canada, and internationally. The company distributes a line of approximately 100,000 metal products, including alloy, aluminum, brass, copper, carbon steel, stainless steel, titanium, and specialty steel products; and provides metals processing services to general manufacturing, non-residential construction, transportation, aerospace, energy, electronics and semiconductor fabrication, and heavy industries.