Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO) Rating Increased to Outperform at Mizuho

by · The Markets Daily

Mizuho upgraded shares of Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO – Free Report) from a neutral rating to an outperform rating in a research note released on Friday morning, Marketbeat.com reports. The firm currently has $85.00 price target on the financial services provider’s stock, up from their prior price target of $84.00.

BRO has been the topic of several other research reports. Raymond James Financial reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Brown & Brown in a research note on Monday, November 3rd. Barclays decreased their price target on Brown & Brown from $83.00 to $82.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, January 27th. Argus raised Brown & Brown to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 27th. Wells Fargo & Company decreased their target price on shares of Brown & Brown from $82.00 to $78.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group reduced their price objective on shares of Brown & Brown from $89.00 to $84.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, January 28th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and fourteen have given a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $90.43.

Check Out Our Latest Stock Report on BRO

Brown & Brown Price Performance

BRO traded up $0.48 on Friday, reaching $71.70. The stock had a trading volume of 4,191,933 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,836,229. The company has a current ratio of 1.66, a quick ratio of 1.66 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.55. The company has a market capitalization of $24.41 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.41, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.15 and a beta of 0.79. Brown & Brown has a fifty-two week low of $65.68 and a fifty-two week high of $125.68. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $75.34 and a 200-day moving average of $83.52.

Brown & Brown (NYSE:BRO – Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Monday, January 26th. The financial services provider reported $0.93 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.91 by $0.02. Brown & Brown had a return on equity of 12.93% and a net margin of 17.84%.The company had revenue of $1.61 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.65 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.86 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 35.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Brown & Brown will post 4.18 EPS for the current year.

Brown & Brown Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, February 11th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, February 4th were paid a dividend of $0.165 per share. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, February 4th. This represents a $0.66 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.9%. Brown & Brown’s payout ratio is 20.63%.

Institutional Trading of Brown & Brown

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Bank of New York Mellon Corp increased its stake in Brown & Brown by 3.8% during the third quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,420,814 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $133,258,000 after acquiring an additional 51,959 shares during the last quarter. Tandem Investment Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Brown & Brown by 69.7% in the 3rd quarter. Tandem Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 1,385,214 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $129,919,000 after purchasing an additional 569,037 shares during the period. Access Investment Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Brown & Brown during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $1,109,000. Invesco Ltd. raised its holdings in Brown & Brown by 1.1% during the 2nd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,166,370 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $461,925,000 after buying an additional 46,235 shares during the period. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in Brown & Brown by 4.8% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 37,330,892 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $3,501,264,000 after buying an additional 1,705,570 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 71.01% of the company’s stock.

About Brown & Brown

(Get Free Report)

Brown & Brown, Inc (NYSE: BRO) is a professional insurance brokerage and risk advisory firm that provides a broad range of property and casualty, employee benefits, personal risk, and specialty insurance products. The company works with commercial, public sector and individual clients to design and place insurance programs, manage claims and loss control, and deliver risk management consulting. Its services also include wholesale brokerage, program administration and other specialty distribution solutions that connect carriers and intermediaries to niche markets.

Brown & Brown operates through a decentralized model of operating units and subsidiaries, enabling local client service with the scale to access national and specialty markets.

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