Norges Bank Acquires Shares of 12,813,255 Smurfit Westrock PLC $SW

Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock PLC (NYSE:SW) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm acquired 12,813,255 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $495,335,000. Norges Bank owned about 2.45% of Smurfit Westrock as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of SW. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd lifted its position in Smurfit Westrock by 81.9% during the second quarter. Orbis Allan Gray Ltd now owns 18,400,418 shares of the company’s stock valued at $793,978,000 after purchasing an additional 8,286,205 shares during the last quarter. UBS Group AG lifted its position in Smurfit Westrock by 272.0% during the third quarter. UBS Group AG now owns 11,240,153 shares of the company’s stock valued at $478,493,000 after purchasing an additional 8,218,351 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 94.4% in the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 11,353,140 shares of the company’s stock valued at $482,917,000 after purchasing an additional 5,511,887 shares during the last quarter. Ruffer LLP lifted its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 473.3% in the 4th quarter. Ruffer LLP now owns 4,504,151 shares of the company’s stock valued at $174,447,000 after purchasing an additional 3,718,562 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Barclays PLC lifted its stake in shares of Smurfit Westrock by 152.2% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 5,269,743 shares of the company’s stock valued at $224,333,000 after purchasing an additional 3,180,531 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 83.38% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on SW shares. The Goldman Sachs Group started coverage on Smurfit Westrock in a research note on Tuesday, March 24th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $49.00 price objective for the company. Zacks Research raised Smurfit Westrock from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Jefferies Financial Group set a $58.00 price objective on Smurfit Westrock in a research note on Thursday, February 12th. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $55.00 to $50.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, March 20th. Finally, Truist Financial set a $50.00 target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a report on Friday, May 1st. Eleven analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $53.00.

Smurfit Westrock Price Performance

Shares of SW stock opened at $41.15 on Monday. Smurfit Westrock PLC has a 52-week low of $32.73 and a 52-week high of $52.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a current ratio of 1.44. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 57.16 and a beta of 0.96. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $39.94 and a 200 day moving average price of $40.53.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, April 30th. The company reported $0.33 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.36 by ($0.03). Smurfit Westrock had a return on equity of 4.96% and a net margin of 1.22%.The business had revenue of $7.71 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.57 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.74 earnings per share. Smurfit Westrock’s revenue was up .7% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Smurfit Westrock PLC will post 2.32 earnings per share for the current year.

Smurfit Westrock Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, June 10th. Investors of record on Friday, May 15th will be paid a dividend of $0.4523 per share. This represents a $1.81 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 15th. Smurfit Westrock’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 251.39%.

Smurfit Westrock Company Profile

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.