Welltower Inc. (NYSE:WELL) Shares Purchased by Busey Bank

Busey Bank raised its position in Welltower Inc. (NYSE:WELL) by 1.9% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 6,881 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after purchasing an additional 127 shares during the quarter. Busey Bank’s holdings in Welltower were worth $867,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in WELL. Retirement Systems of Alabama raised its position in shares of Welltower by 3.7% during the 3rd quarter. Retirement Systems of Alabama now owns 470,419 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $60,228,000 after buying an additional 16,946 shares in the last quarter. Barclays PLC lifted its position in Welltower by 29.2% in the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,684,446 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $215,659,000 after purchasing an additional 380,888 shares during the period. Diversified Trust Co boosted its stake in Welltower by 93.8% during the 3rd quarter. Diversified Trust Co now owns 18,474 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $2,365,000 after purchasing an additional 8,940 shares in the last quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC increased its position in shares of Welltower by 20.1% during the 4th quarter. Park Avenue Securities LLC now owns 13,456 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $1,696,000 after purchasing an additional 2,250 shares during the period. Finally, Nordea Investment Management AB raised its stake in shares of Welltower by 28.1% in the 4th quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 1,477,388 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $185,649,000 after buying an additional 324,520 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 94.80% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently issued reports on WELL. Raymond James lifted their target price on Welltower from $145.00 to $155.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. Mizuho boosted their target price on shares of Welltower from $136.00 to $141.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 5th. Bank of America raised their target price on shares of Welltower from $190.00 to $221.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, January 24th. Scotiabank increased their price objective on Welltower from $142.00 to $144.00 and gave the company a “sector outperform” rating in a research report on Monday. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Welltower from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $134.96.

Welltower Stock Up 1.6 %

Shares of Welltower stock opened at $137.08 on Friday. Welltower Inc. has a 1 year low of $85.40 and a 1 year high of $140.75. The company has a market cap of $85.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 90.19, a P/E/G ratio of 2.64 and a beta of 1.22. The company has a current ratio of 4.10, a quick ratio of 4.10 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $130.08 and a 200 day moving average price of $126.05.

Welltower (NYSE:WELL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.73 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.04 by ($0.31). Welltower had a return on equity of 3.20% and a net margin of 12.22%. The company had revenue of $2.06 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.95 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.92 earnings per share. Welltower’s revenue for the quarter was up 23.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that Welltower Inc. will post 4.3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About Welltower

Welltower Inc (NYSE:WELL), a real estate investment trust (“REIT”) and S&P 500 company headquartered in Toledo, Ohio, is driving the transformation of health care infrastructure. Welltower invests with leading seniors housing operators, post-acute providers and health systems to fund the real estate infrastructure needed to scale innovative care delivery models and improve people’s wellness and overall health care experience.