WestEnd Advisors LLC Sells 197 Shares of Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU)

WestEnd Advisors LLC cut its stake in Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) by 21.7% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 710 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock after selling 197 shares during the period. WestEnd Advisors LLC’s holdings in Micron Technology were worth $60,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Empowered Funds LLC increased its position in shares of Micron Technology by 13.2% during the fourth quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 61,364 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock worth $5,164,000 after acquiring an additional 7,176 shares during the period. Kingsview Wealth Management LLC raised its position in Micron Technology by 7.3% during the 4th quarter. Kingsview Wealth Management LLC now owns 4,867 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock valued at $410,000 after purchasing an additional 330 shares in the last quarter. Apollon Wealth Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Micron Technology by 1.1% in the 4th quarter. Apollon Wealth Management LLC now owns 24,716 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock worth $2,080,000 after buying an additional 271 shares during the period. Shepherd Financial Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Micron Technology during the fourth quarter valued at $223,000. Finally, EULAV Asset Management raised its holdings in shares of Micron Technology by 80.0% in the fourth quarter. EULAV Asset Management now owns 90,000 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock valued at $7,574,000 after acquiring an additional 40,000 shares in the last quarter. 80.84% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently commented on MU. Mizuho reduced their price target on shares of Micron Technology from $135.00 to $115.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, December 19th. Robert W. Baird reduced their price objective on shares of Micron Technology from $150.00 to $130.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. UBS Group dropped their target price on Micron Technology from $135.00 to $125.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price target on Micron Technology from $135.00 to $130.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on Micron Technology from $175.00 to $140.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and twenty-three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $134.96.

Insider Activity at Micron Technology

In other Micron Technology news, EVP April S. Arnzen sold 4,890 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $85.21, for a total transaction of $416,676.90. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 181,223 shares in the company, valued at approximately $15,442,011.83. This represents a 2.63 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 0.30% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Micron Technology Stock Down 2.4 %

Micron Technology stock opened at $92.30 on Friday. Micron Technology, Inc. has a 52 week low of $79.15 and a 52 week high of $157.54. The firm has a market cap of $102.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.60 and a beta of 1.18. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $96.63 and its 200 day moving average price is $99.15. The company has a quick ratio of 1.75, a current ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28.

Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The semiconductor manufacturer reported $1.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.60 by $0.19. The firm had revenue of $8.71 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.71 billion. Micron Technology had a net margin of 13.34% and a return on equity of 8.32%. The business’s revenue was up 84.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted ($0.95) EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Micron Technology, Inc. will post 6.29 earnings per share for the current year.

Micron Technology Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 15th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 30th were given a dividend of $0.115 per share. This represents a $0.46 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.50%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 30th. Micron Technology’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 13.26%.

Micron Technology Profile

Micron Technology, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and sells memory and storage products worldwide. The company operates through four segments: Compute and Networking Business Unit, Mobile Business Unit, Embedded Business Unit, and Storage Business Unit. It provides memory and storage technologies comprising dynamic random access memory semiconductor devices with low latency that provide high-speed data retrieval; non-volatile and re-writeable semiconductor storage devices; and non-volatile re-writable semiconductor memory devices that provide fast read speeds under the Micron and Crucial brands, as well as through private labels.