Chesley Taft & Associates LLC Sells 2,156 Shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR)

Chesley Taft & Associates LLC trimmed its stake in shares of Danaher Co. (NYSE:DHR) by 2.8% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 74,841 shares of the conglomerate’s stock after selling 2,156 shares during the quarter. Chesley Taft & Associates LLC’s holdings in Danaher were worth $17,180,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of DHR. FMR LLC raised its holdings in Danaher by 15.8% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 23,617,424 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $6,566,116,000 after acquiring an additional 3,217,631 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc grew its position in shares of Danaher by 2.4% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,964,031 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $1,490,112,000 after purchasing an additional 139,989 shares during the last quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC increased its stake in shares of Danaher by 3.0% during the third quarter. UBS AM a distinct business unit of UBS ASSET MANAGEMENT AMERICAS LLC now owns 5,097,986 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $1,417,342,000 after purchasing an additional 148,251 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its holdings in Danaher by 2.6% during the 3rd quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 4,552,640 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $1,265,725,000 after purchasing an additional 116,299 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA boosted its stake in Danaher by 17.6% in the 3rd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 3,582,982 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $996,141,000 after purchasing an additional 535,254 shares during the period. 79.05% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts have weighed in on DHR shares. Stifel Nicolaus increased their price objective on Danaher from $250.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Guggenheim began coverage on shares of Danaher in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $275.00 price objective for the company. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Danaher from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $285.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. UBS Group lowered their target price on shares of Danaher from $309.00 to $305.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Finally, Citigroup cut their price target on Danaher from $305.00 to $285.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, January 6th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $286.80.

Danaher Stock Down 1.4 %

Shares of DHR opened at $238.41 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $172.20 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 45.50, a PEG ratio of 4.30 and a beta of 0.83. Danaher Co. has a 52 week low of $222.53 and a 52 week high of $281.70. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a current ratio of 1.37. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $234.75 and a 200-day moving average of $253.50.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The conglomerate reported $1.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.57 by $0.14. Danaher had a net margin of 16.39% and a return on equity of 10.62%. The business had revenue of $5.80 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.59 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $2.02 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 3.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Danaher Co. will post 7.49 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Danaher Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, December 27th will be issued a dividend of $0.27 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, December 27th. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.45%. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 20.61%.

About Danaher

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.