Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS) CEO Sells $9,356,990.72 in Stock

Reliance, Inc. (NYSE:RS) CEO Karla R. Lewis sold 31,136 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $300.52, for a total value of $9,356,990.72. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 90,230 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $27,115,919.60. This trade represents a 25.65 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link.

Reliance Price Performance

Shares of RS opened at $294.23 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $15.92 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.06 and a beta of 0.90. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $283.00 and a 200-day moving average of $289.58. The company has a current ratio of 3.21, a quick ratio of 1.58 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.10. Reliance, Inc. has a 52 week low of $256.98 and a 52 week high of $342.20.

Reliance (NYSE:RS) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, February 19th. The industrial products company reported $2.22 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.74 by ($0.52). The firm had revenue of $3.13 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.04 billion. Reliance had a return on equity of 11.87% and a net margin of 6.33%. As a group, analysts forecast that Reliance, Inc. will post 16.98 EPS for the current year.

Reliance Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 21st. Investors of record on Friday, March 7th will be issued a $1.20 dividend. This is an increase from Reliance’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.10. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 7th. This represents a $4.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.63%. Reliance’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 31.09%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have weighed in on RS. The Goldman Sachs Group began coverage on Reliance in a research note on Monday, December 2nd. They set a “neutral” rating and a $341.00 price objective for the company. Wolfe Research upgraded Reliance from an “underperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Finally, KeyCorp lifted their target price on Reliance from $321.00 to $327.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $329.17.

Institutional Trading of Reliance

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in RS. Raymond James & Associates lifted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 26.1% in the 3rd quarter. Raymond James & Associates now owns 33,713 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $9,750,000 after purchasing an additional 6,985 shares during the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 27,269.0% in the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 112,213 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $32,453,000 after purchasing an additional 111,803 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. lifted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 9.7% in the 3rd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 8,769 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $2,536,000 after purchasing an additional 777 shares during the last quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. lifted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 112.5% in the 3rd quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 8,569 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $2,482,000 after purchasing an additional 4,537 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Forsta AP Fonden lifted its holdings in shares of Reliance by 6.6% in the 3rd quarter. Forsta AP Fonden now owns 11,300 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $3,268,000 after purchasing an additional 700 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 79.26% of the company’s stock.

Reliance Company 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.