Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH Trims Stock Position in Qiagen N.V. $QGEN

Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH lowered its holdings in shares of Qiagen N.V. (NYSE:QGEN) by 17.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 107,261 shares of the company’s stock after selling 22,569 shares during the quarter. Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH owned approximately 0.05% of Qiagen worth $4,824,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Verition Fund Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Qiagen during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $2,575,000. Walleye Trading LLC bought a new position in Qiagen in the 4th quarter worth approximately $1,109,000. MML Investors Services LLC boosted its stake in Qiagen by 8.7% in the 4th quarter. MML Investors Services LLC now owns 46,185 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,077,000 after purchasing an additional 3,690 shares during the period. Entropy Technologies LP bought a new position in Qiagen in the 4th quarter worth approximately $374,000. Finally, Barclays PLC boosted its stake in Qiagen by 41.7% in the 4th quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,539,762 shares of the company’s stock worth $69,243,000 after purchasing an additional 452,831 shares during the period. 70.00% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts have weighed in on QGEN shares. Stifel Nicolaus set a $36.00 price target on Qiagen and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, May 18th. Wall Street Zen downgraded Qiagen from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, March 28th. Zacks Research upgraded Qiagen from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 29th. Barclays set a $38.00 target price on Qiagen and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 29th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reiterated a “buy” rating and set a $43.00 target price on shares of Qiagen in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, four have assigned a Buy rating, six have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $44.98.

Qiagen Stock Up 0.5%

NYSE QGEN opened at $37.21 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a quick ratio of 2.57 and a current ratio of 3.21. The company has a market capitalization of $7.67 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.43, a P/E/G ratio of 3.68 and a beta of 0.66. Qiagen N.V. has a one year low of $32.53 and a one year high of $57.81. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $36.91 and a 200-day moving average price of $43.80.

Qiagen (NYSE:QGEN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 7th. The company reported $0.54 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.54. Qiagen had a return on equity of 14.40% and a net margin of 19.16%.The company had revenue of $492.32 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $496.15 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.56 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Qiagen N.V. will post 2.43 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Qiagen Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared an annual dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, July 14th. Investors of record on Tuesday, July 7th will be issued a dividend of $0.35 per share. This represents a yield of 104.0%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, July 7th. This is a boost from Qiagen’s previous annual dividend of $0.26. Qiagen’s payout ratio is currently 13.61%.

Qiagen Profile

Qiagen NV (NYSE: QGEN) is a global provider of sample and assay technologies designed to enable molecular testing in the fields of molecular diagnostics, applied testing, academic research and pharmaceutical development. The company’s solutions span the full workflow of nucleic acid and protein analysis, offering customers standardized kits, instruments and software tools that streamline the preparation, detection and quantification of DNA, RNA and proteins.

The company’s product portfolio includes nucleic acid extraction and purification systems, polymerase chain reaction (PCR) reagents and instrumentation, digital PCR platforms, next-generation sequencing (NGS) library?preparation kits and proteomics solutions.