Natixis Advisors LLC Purchases 284,494 Shares of W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB)

Natixis Advisors LLC grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) by 57.9% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 775,429 shares of the insurance provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 284,494 shares during the quarter. Natixis Advisors LLC owned about 0.20% of W. R. Berkley worth $43,990,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 0.8% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 24,439,361 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $2,161,417,000 after buying an additional 195,763 shares during the period. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 0.7% during the 2nd quarter. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC now owns 7,553,875 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $593,584,000 after buying an additional 54,530 shares during the period. Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 211.3% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 3,674,171 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $208,436,000 after buying an additional 2,493,758 shares during the period. APG Asset Management N.V. grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 3.5% during the 2nd quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. now owns 2,698,311 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $197,838,000 after buying an additional 92,242 shares during the period. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its position in shares of W. R. Berkley by 7.4% during the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,037,599 shares of the insurance provider’s stock worth $160,128,000 after buying an additional 139,588 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 68.82% of the company’s stock.

W. R. Berkley Trading Up 1.8 %

NYSE WRB opened at $60.74 on Monday. The stock has a market capitalization of $23.15 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 15.56, a PEG ratio of 1.21 and a beta of 0.62. W. R. Berkley Co. has a one year low of $45.75 and a one year high of $61.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34, a current ratio of 0.36 and a quick ratio of 0.36. The business’s fifty day moving average is $58.46 and its 200-day moving average is $56.18.

W. R. Berkley (NYSE:WRB) last released its earnings results on Monday, October 21st. The insurance provider reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.92 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $2.93 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.93 billion. W. R. Berkley had a return on equity of 20.41% and a net margin of 11.96%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.90 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that W. R. Berkley Co. will post 3.96 EPS for the current year.

W. R. Berkley Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 30th. Shareholders of record on Monday, September 23rd were issued a dividend of $0.08 per share. This represents a $0.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.53%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, September 23rd. W. R. Berkley’s payout ratio is presently 8.20%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

WRB has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. UBS Group raised their price objective on shares of W. R. Berkley from $67.00 to $69.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 22nd. Barclays began coverage on shares of W. R. Berkley in a research report on Wednesday, September 4th. They issued an “underweight” rating and a $56.00 price target for the company. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price target on shares of W. R. Berkley from $57.00 to $63.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 22nd. StockNews.com raised shares of W. R. Berkley from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 12th. Finally, Truist Financial lifted their price target on shares of W. R. Berkley from $64.00 to $68.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $63.08.

W. R. Berkley Profile

W. R. Berkley Corporation, an insurance holding company, operates as a commercial lines writers worldwide. It operates in two segments, Insurance and Reinsurance & Monoline Excess. The Insurance segment underwrites commercial insurance business, including excess and surplus lines, admitted lines, and specialty personal lines.