Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Raises Eastern Bankshares (NASDAQ:EBC) Price Target to $21.00

Eastern Bankshares (NASDAQ:EBC) had its price objective boosted by analysts at Keefe, Bruyette & Woods from $19.00 to $21.00 in a note issued to investors on Wednesday,Benzinga reports. The firm presently has an “outperform” rating on the stock. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods’ target price suggests a potential upside of 16.15% from the company’s previous close.

Separately, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded Eastern Bankshares from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and increased their price target for the stock from $14.00 to $18.50 in a report on Tuesday, August 6th.

Eastern Bankshares Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:EBC opened at $18.08 on Wednesday. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $17.36 and its 200 day simple moving average is $15.83. Eastern Bankshares has a fifty-two week low of $12.22 and a fifty-two week high of $19.40. The company has a market capitalization of $3.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.79 and a beta of 0.92.

Eastern Bankshares (NASDAQ:EBC) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The company reported $0.25 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.33 by ($0.08). Eastern Bankshares had a return on equity of 4.49% and a net margin of 38.00%. The firm had revenue of $299.55 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $215.92 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.32 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that Eastern Bankshares will post 0.98 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Deborah C. Jackson sold 5,713 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $18.56, for a total transaction of $106,033.28. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 67,284 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,248,791.04. This trade represents a 7.83 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Company insiders own 1.15% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. FMR LLC boosted its stake in shares of Eastern Bankshares by 36.3% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 18,431,075 shares of the company’s stock worth $302,085,000 after buying an additional 4,913,376 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its holdings in Eastern Bankshares by 20.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 6,940,433 shares of the company’s stock worth $113,754,000 after acquiring an additional 1,170,276 shares in the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its stake in Eastern Bankshares by 24.5% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 4,835,761 shares of the company’s stock valued at $67,599,000 after purchasing an additional 950,150 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in shares of Eastern Bankshares by 23.0% during the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 4,587,497 shares of the company’s stock worth $75,203,000 after purchasing an additional 859,136 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Jennison Associates LLC raised its stake in shares of Eastern Bankshares by 13.4% during the 3rd quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 3,969,558 shares of the company’s stock worth $65,061,000 after purchasing an additional 467,663 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 71.68% of the company’s stock.

About Eastern Bankshares

Eastern Bankshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Eastern Bank that provides banking products and services primarily to retail, commercial, and small business customers. The company provides deposit accounts, interest checking accounts, money market accounts, savings accounts, and time certificates of deposit accounts.