Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. Acquires 62 Shares of AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV)

Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. lifted its stake in AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) by 0.7% in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 9,416 shares of the company’s stock after acquiring an additional 62 shares during the period. AbbVie makes up about 0.9% of Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc.’s holdings, making the stock its 23rd largest holding. Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc.’s holdings in AbbVie were worth $1,858,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in AbbVie by 6.2% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 170,376,746 shares of the company’s stock worth $31,025,605,000 after acquiring an additional 9,978,415 shares during the period. Capital International Investors grew its stake in AbbVie by 6.9% in the 1st quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 48,098,784 shares of the company’s stock worth $8,758,789,000 after buying an additional 3,110,601 shares in the last quarter. Capital Research Global Investors increased its holdings in shares of AbbVie by 3.3% in the 1st quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 31,295,150 shares of the company’s stock worth $5,698,847,000 after buying an additional 992,496 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc lifted its holdings in shares of AbbVie by 0.9% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 15,277,480 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,620,382,000 after acquiring an additional 134,239 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC grew its position in AbbVie by 12.8% in the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 10,898,246 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,984,490,000 after acquiring an additional 1,240,434 shares in the last quarter. 70.23% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on ABBV. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of AbbVie from $200.00 to $212.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, October 7th. Truist Financial raised their price objective on AbbVie from $210.00 to $215.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 10th. Citigroup boosted their target price on AbbVie from $215.00 to $226.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on AbbVie from $218.00 to $231.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Bank of America lifted their target price on shares of AbbVie from $185.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $201.00.

AbbVie Stock Performance

NYSE:ABBV traded down $1.45 on Monday, hitting $202.10. The stock had a trading volume of 733,959 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,307,825. AbbVie Inc. has a 52-week low of $135.85 and a 52-week high of $207.32. The stock has a market cap of $356.98 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 70.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.78 and a beta of 0.63. The company has a quick ratio of 0.71, a current ratio of 0.81 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 8.51. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $194.12 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $179.60.

AbbVie (NYSE:ABBV) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The company reported $3.00 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.92 by $0.08. AbbVie had a net margin of 9.22% and a return on equity of 226.99%. The business had revenue of $14.46 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $14.28 billion. During the same period last year, the firm earned $2.95 earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 3.8% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts predict that AbbVie Inc. will post 10.95 earnings per share for the current year.

AbbVie Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, January 15th will be paid a dividend of $1.64 per share. This is a boost from AbbVie’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.55. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, January 15th. This represents a $6.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.25%. AbbVie’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 215.28%.

About AbbVie

AbbVie Inc discovers, develops, manufactures, and sells pharmaceuticals worldwide. The company offers Humira, an injection for autoimmune and intestinal Behçet's diseases, and pyoderma gangrenosum; Skyrizi to treat moderate to severe plaque psoriasis, psoriatic disease, and Crohn's disease; Rinvoq to treat rheumatoid and psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, atopic dermatitis, axial spondyloarthropathy, ulcerative colitis, and Crohn's disease; Imbruvica for the treatment of adult patients with blood cancers; Epkinly to treat lymphoma; Elahere to treat cancer; and Venclexta/Venclyxto to treat blood cancers.