B&L Asset Management LLC Purchases Shares of 13,607 Comcast Co. (NASDAQ:CMCSA)

B&L Asset Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Comcast Co. (NASDAQ:CMCSA) in the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm acquired 13,607 shares of the cable giant’s stock, valued at approximately $568,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Erste Asset Management GmbH bought a new stake in Comcast during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $2,777,000. True Wealth Design LLC grew its holdings in shares of Comcast by 1,783.9% during the third quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 3,391 shares of the cable giant’s stock worth $142,000 after purchasing an additional 3,211 shares during the last quarter. Semmax Financial Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Comcast by 1.1% in the third quarter. Semmax Financial Advisors Inc. now owns 140,357 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $6,181,000 after buying an additional 1,545 shares in the last quarter. ARGA Investment Management LP increased its stake in shares of Comcast by 45.7% in the third quarter. ARGA Investment Management LP now owns 260,458 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $10,879,000 after buying an additional 81,636 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Encompass More Asset Management raised its holdings in shares of Comcast by 5.0% in the third quarter. Encompass More Asset Management now owns 8,748 shares of the cable giant’s stock valued at $365,000 after buying an additional 414 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 84.32% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have weighed in on the stock. TD Cowen lowered their price objective on shares of Comcast from $50.00 to $48.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Macquarie raised their price target on shares of Comcast from $40.00 to $42.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, November 18th. Benchmark reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $60.00 price objective on shares of Comcast in a report on Tuesday, November 19th. Evercore ISI raised Comcast to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 21st. Finally, Pivotal Research boosted their target price on Comcast from $47.00 to $54.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating, nine have given a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $47.19.

Comcast Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:CMCSA opened at $43.19 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $42.29 and its 200 day simple moving average is $40.17. Comcast Co. has a fifty-two week low of $36.43 and a fifty-two week high of $47.11. The company has a market capitalization of $165.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 11.61, a P/E/G ratio of 1.63 and a beta of 1.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.14, a current ratio of 0.72 and a quick ratio of 0.72.

Comcast (NASDAQ:CMCSA) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The cable giant reported $1.12 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.06 by $0.06. Comcast had a net margin of 11.92% and a return on equity of 19.81%. The company had revenue of $32.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $31.78 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $1.08 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.5% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Comcast Co. will post 4.26 earnings per share for the current year.

Comcast Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 29th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, January 8th will be paid a $0.31 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, January 8th. This represents a $1.24 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.87%. Comcast’s payout ratio is 33.33%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, President Michael J. Cavanagh sold 25,537 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $42.59, for a total value of $1,087,620.83. Following the sale, the president now directly owns 534,849 shares in the company, valued at $22,779,218.91. The trade was a 4.56 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Brian L. Roberts sold 234,464 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $42.66, for a total value of $10,002,234.24. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 6,669,928 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $284,539,128.48. This represents a 3.40 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 1.26% of the company’s stock.

About Comcast

Comcast Corporation operates as a media and technology company worldwide. It operates through Residential Connectivity & Platforms, Business Services Connectivity, Media, Studios, and Theme Parks segments. The Residential Connectivity & Platforms segment provides residential broadband and wireless connectivity services, residential and business video services, sky-branded entertainment television networks, and advertising.