Danaher (NYSE:DHR) Rating Lowered to Hold at StockNews.com

StockNews.com cut shares of Danaher (NYSE:DHR) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note published on Saturday morning.

Other analysts also recently issued research reports about the stock. Wells Fargo & Company started coverage on shares of Danaher in a report on Tuesday, August 27th. They issued an “equal weight” rating and a $280.00 target price on the stock. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their target price on Danaher from $333.00 to $311.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Raymond James reduced their price target on Danaher from $310.00 to $300.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. UBS Group dropped their price objective on Danaher from $309.00 to $305.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Finally, KeyCorp raised their target price on Danaher from $290.00 to $310.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fifteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Danaher currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $287.95.

Danaher Price Performance

DHR stock opened at $234.89 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.37, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32. The company has a market capitalization of $169.66 billion, a P/E ratio of 44.83, a PEG ratio of 4.33 and a beta of 0.83. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $246.92 and a 200-day simple moving average of $257.42. Danaher has a twelve month low of $222.53 and a twelve month high of $281.70.

Danaher (NYSE:DHR) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The conglomerate reported $1.71 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.57 by $0.14. The firm had revenue of $5.80 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.59 billion. Danaher had a return on equity of 10.62% and a net margin of 16.39%. The firm’s revenue was up 3.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $2.02 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Danaher will post 7.5 EPS for the current year.

Danaher Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, December 27th will be paid a dividend of $0.27 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, December 27th. This represents a $1.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.46%. Danaher’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 20.61%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Danaher

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Lord Abbett & CO. LLC lifted its position in shares of Danaher by 10.1% in the third quarter. Lord Abbett & CO. LLC now owns 939,335 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $261,154,000 after acquiring an additional 85,839 shares in the last quarter. Garden State Investment Advisory Services LLC raised its stake in Danaher by 13.9% in the 3rd quarter. Garden State Investment Advisory Services LLC now owns 1,196 shares of the conglomerate’s stock valued at $333,000 after purchasing an additional 146 shares during the last quarter. Oddo BHF Asset Management Sas purchased a new position in Danaher in the 3rd quarter valued at about $24,204,000. Peapack Gladstone Financial Corp boosted its stake in shares of Danaher by 2.2% during the 3rd quarter. Peapack Gladstone Financial Corp now owns 106,616 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $29,641,000 after purchasing an additional 2,314 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Tidal Investments LLC grew its holdings in shares of Danaher by 8.5% during the third quarter. Tidal Investments LLC now owns 52,947 shares of the conglomerate’s stock worth $14,720,000 after buying an additional 4,156 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.05% of the company’s stock.

Danaher Company Profile

Danaher Corporation designs, manufactures, and markets professional, medical, industrial, and commercial products and services worldwide. The Biotechnology segments offers bioprocess technologies, consumables, and services that advance, accelerate, and integrate the development and manufacture of therapeutics; cell line and cell culture media development services; cell culture media, process liquids and buffers for manufacturing, chromatography resins, filtration technologies, aseptic fill finish; single-use hardware and consumables and services, such as the design and installation of full manufacturing suites; lab filtration, separation, and purification; lab-scale protein purification and analytical tools; reagents, membranes, and services; and healthcare filtration solutions.