Segment Wealth Management LLC Sells 161 Shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL)

Segment Wealth Management LLC lessened its position in shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) by 8.4% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,755 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 161 shares during the quarter. Segment Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Ecolab were worth $348,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Riverwater Partners LLC boosted its position in Ecolab by 3.3% in the 4th quarter. Riverwater Partners LLC now owns 1,654 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $328,000 after buying an additional 53 shares during the period. Woodmont Investment Counsel LLC raised its position in Ecolab by 1.6% during the 4th quarter. Woodmont Investment Counsel LLC now owns 3,549 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $704,000 after purchasing an additional 56 shares in the last quarter. GS Investments Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Ecolab by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. GS Investments Inc. now owns 16,041 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,717,000 after buying an additional 62 shares during the period. Personal CFO Solutions LLC increased its stake in shares of Ecolab by 3.6% during the third quarter. Personal CFO Solutions LLC now owns 1,875 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $318,000 after buying an additional 66 shares during the period. Finally, Linscomb & Williams Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Ecolab by 0.7% in the third quarter. Linscomb & Williams Inc. now owns 10,352 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,754,000 after acquiring an additional 69 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 74.91% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on ECL. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $240.00 to $250.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, February 14th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on Ecolab from $212.00 to $227.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of Ecolab from $230.00 to $240.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 27th. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $238.00 target price on shares of Ecolab in a report on Tuesday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered shares of Ecolab from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their target price for the stock from $200.00 to $220.00 in a report on Wednesday, February 14th. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $226.76.

Ecolab Trading Down 0.3 %

Shares of Ecolab stock opened at $225.00 on Wednesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.94. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $220.16 and a 200-day simple moving average of $196.68. The stock has a market cap of $64.33 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 47.14, a PEG ratio of 2.65 and a beta of 1.10. Ecolab Inc. has a 12-month low of $156.72 and a 12-month high of $231.86.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 13th. The basic materials company reported $1.55 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.54 by $0.01. Ecolab had a net margin of 8.96% and a return on equity of 19.36%. The company had revenue of $3.94 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.92 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.27 earnings per share. Ecolab’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.3% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities analysts forecast that Ecolab Inc. will post 6.42 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Ecolab Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 15th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, March 19th will be given a dividend of $0.57 per share. This represents a $2.28 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.01%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 18th. Ecolab’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 47.60%.

About Ecolab

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.