41,246 Shares in Freeport-McMoRan Inc. (NYSE:FCX) Purchased by Allstate Corp

Allstate Corp bought a new stake in Freeport-McMoRan Inc. (NYSE:FCX) during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund bought 41,246 shares of the natural resource company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,571,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in FCX. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 0.5% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 123,219,298 shares of the natural resource company’s stock worth $4,692,191,000 after buying an additional 642,776 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 1.9% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 28,891,058 shares of the natural resource company’s stock worth $1,436,455,000 after acquiring an additional 529,099 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 9.5% in the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 27,310,294 shares of the natural resource company’s stock valued at $1,348,522,000 after purchasing an additional 2,366,187 shares in the last quarter. Amundi grew its holdings in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 30.2% during the 4th quarter. Amundi now owns 21,580,960 shares of the natural resource company’s stock valued at $857,305,000 after purchasing an additional 5,001,531 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Mountaineer Partners Management LLC increased its position in Freeport-McMoRan by 4,767.8% during the 3rd quarter. Mountaineer Partners Management LLC now owns 11,933,126 shares of the natural resource company’s stock worth $595,702,000 after purchasing an additional 11,687,982 shares in the last quarter. 80.77% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have weighed in on FCX. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised shares of Freeport-McMoRan from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $47.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Thursday, March 6th. Sanford C. Bernstein lowered Freeport-McMoRan from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and reduced their price objective for the stock from $51.00 to $46.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. Scotiabank cut their price target on Freeport-McMoRan from $48.00 to $45.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 24th. Argus downgraded Freeport-McMoRan from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, January 31st. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded shares of Freeport-McMoRan from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 20th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, nine have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Freeport-McMoRan presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $52.04.

Freeport-McMoRan Price Performance

FCX stock opened at $38.36 on Monday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.18, a current ratio of 2.42 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31. The firm has a market cap of $55.13 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.74, a PEG ratio of 0.87 and a beta of 1.87. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $38.14 and its 200 day simple moving average is $41.98. Freeport-McMoRan Inc. has a 12-month low of $33.98 and a 12-month high of $55.24.

Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 23rd. The natural resource company reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.36 by ($0.05). Freeport-McMoRan had a net margin of 7.42% and a return on equity of 7.50%. On average, analysts expect that Freeport-McMoRan Inc. will post 1.68 earnings per share for the current year.

Freeport-McMoRan Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, April 15th will be issued a dividend of $0.15 per share. This represents a $0.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.56%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, April 15th. Freeport-McMoRan’s payout ratio is 23.26%.

About Freeport-McMoRan

Freeport-McMoRan Inc engages in the mining of mineral properties in North America, South America, and Indonesia. It primarily explores for copper, gold, molybdenum, silver, and other metals. The company's assets include the Grasberg minerals district in Indonesia; Morenci, Bagdad, Safford, Sierrita, and Miami in Arizona; Chino and Tyrone in New Mexico; and Henderson and Climax in Colorado, North America, as well as Cerro Verde in Peru and El Abra in Chile.