32,550 Shares in Popular, Inc. $BPOP Purchased by VIRGINIA RETIREMENT SYSTEMS ET Al

VIRGINIA RETIREMENT SYSTEMS ET Al acquired a new stake in Popular, Inc. (NASDAQ:BPOP) in the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 32,550 shares of the bank’s stock, valued at approximately $5,344,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Parallel Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in Popular by 30.5% during the 1st quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 321 shares of the bank’s stock worth $43,000 after buying an additional 75 shares during the last quarter. Xponance LLC raised its position in shares of Popular by 2.1% during the 4th quarter. Xponance LLC now owns 3,892 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $485,000 after acquiring an additional 80 shares in the last quarter. Gamco Investors INC. ET AL raised its position in shares of Popular by 1.2% during the 1st quarter. Gamco Investors INC. ET AL now owns 7,262 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $974,000 after acquiring an additional 84 shares in the last quarter. Severin Investments LLC lifted its stake in Popular by 1.9% during the first quarter. Severin Investments LLC now owns 4,799 shares of the bank’s stock worth $644,000 after purchasing an additional 91 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC lifted its stake in Popular by 1.7% during the first quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 5,693 shares of the bank’s stock worth $764,000 after purchasing an additional 95 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.27% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have weighed in on the stock. Truist Financial boosted their target price on shares of Popular from $192.00 to $197.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 24th. Weiss Ratings restated a “buy (a-)” rating on shares of Popular in a research report on Friday, July 31st. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on shares of Popular from $180.00 to $200.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 10th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price objective on shares of Popular from $190.00 to $207.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 24th. Finally, Citigroup raised their target price on shares of Popular from $178.00 to $188.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, June 25th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have assigned a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Popular has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $187.08.

Insider Buying and Selling at Popular

In other news, Director Maria Ferre sold 3,385 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $175.42, for a total value of $593,796.70. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 10,156 shares in the company, valued at $1,781,565.52. This represents a 25.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, VP Adorno Rodriguez sold 600 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $168.79, for a total value of $101,274.00. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president directly owned 2,492 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $420,624.68. This represents a 19.40% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold a total of 53,561 shares of company stock valued at $9,392,259 over the last 90 days. 2.13% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Popular Stock Down 2.2%

BPOP stock opened at $167.58 on Wednesday. The company has a market capitalization of $10.69 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.32, a PEG ratio of 0.66 and a beta of 0.60. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $171.63 and a 200 day simple moving average of $154.78. Popular, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $108.74 and a fifty-two week high of $179.24.

Popular (NASDAQ:BPOP) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 23rd. The bank reported $4.35 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.72 by $0.63. Popular had a net margin of 21.37% and a return on equity of 15.34%. The business had revenue of $846.92 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $878.41 million. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $3.09 earnings per share. Equities analysts anticipate that Popular, Inc. will post 15.72 EPS for the current year.

Popular Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 1st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 10th will be issued a dividend of $0.90 per share. This is a positive change from Popular’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.75. This represents a $3.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, September 10th. Popular’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 20.27%.

About Popular

Popular, Inc, headquartered in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is a financial holding company and a leading provider of banking services in the United States mainland and Puerto Rico. Through its primary subsidiaries—Banco Popular de Puerto Rico and Popular Bank—the company delivers comprehensive commercial and consumer banking solutions. It offers deposit products, lending facilities, cash management services and payment-processing solutions designed for individuals, small businesses and large corporations.

The company’s product suite encompasses checking and savings accounts, certificates of deposit, residential and commercial mortgage loans, business lines of credit and credit cards.