AZZ Inc. (NYSE:AZZ) Sees Large Increase in Short Interest

AZZ Inc. (NYSE:AZZ) saw a significant increase in short interest in the month of November. As of November 15th, there was short interest totalling 489,300 shares, an increase of 16.9% from the October 31st total of 418,700 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 165,200 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 3.0 days.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its stake in AZZ by 325.3% during the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 122,141 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $9,435,000 after acquiring an additional 93,420 shares in the last quarter. Delphi Management Inc. MA boosted its stake in AZZ by 11.9% during the second quarter. Delphi Management Inc. MA now owns 23,685 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,830,000 after acquiring an additional 2,521 shares in the last quarter. Rhumbline Advisers boosted its stake in AZZ by 8.7% during the second quarter. Rhumbline Advisers now owns 85,547 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $6,608,000 after acquiring an additional 6,847 shares in the last quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. boosted its stake in AZZ by 81,999.5% during the second quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. now owns 153,526 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $11,860,000 after acquiring an additional 153,339 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Thrivent Financial for Lutherans lifted its stake in shares of AZZ by 25.7% in the second quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 59,716 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $4,613,000 after buying an additional 12,226 shares in the last quarter. 90.93% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

AZZ Trading Down 2.3 %

Shares of AZZ traded down $2.16 during trading hours on Tuesday, hitting $93.53. 33,821 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 227,759. AZZ has a fifty-two week low of $50.04 and a fifty-two week high of $97.98. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.91, a current ratio of 1.85 and a quick ratio of 1.32. The business has a 50-day moving average of $82.91 and a 200-day moving average of $80.56. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.79 billion, a P/E ratio of 72.46, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.30 and a beta of 1.30.

AZZ (NYSE:AZZ) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 9th. The industrial products company reported $1.37 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.32 by $0.05. The company had revenue of $409.01 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $409.50 million. AZZ had a net margin of 7.63% and a return on equity of 16.88%. AZZ’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.27 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that AZZ will post 5.11 EPS for the current year.

AZZ Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Friday, October 18th were paid a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.73%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, October 18th. AZZ’s dividend payout ratio is presently 53.13%.

AZZ Company Profile

AZZ Inc provides hot-dip galvanizing and coil coating solutions in North America. It offers metal finishing solutions for corrosion protection, including hot-dip galvanizing, spin galvanizing, powder coating, anodizing, and plating to steel fabrication and other industries, as well as to fabricators or manufacturers that provide services to the transmission and distribution, bridge and highway, petrochemical, and general industrial markets; and original equipment manufacturers.