Merit Financial Group LLC Buys 23,261 Shares of Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC)

Merit Financial Group LLC boosted its stake in Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) by 28.1% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 106,096 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 23,261 shares during the period. Merit Financial Group LLC’s holdings in Bank of America were worth $3,572,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Northern Trust Corp lifted its stake in Bank of America by 2.1% in the third quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 67,648,727 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,852,222,000 after buying an additional 1,397,469 shares during the period. Barclays PLC lifted its stake in Bank of America by 97.3% in the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 41,290,694 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,130,538,000 after buying an additional 20,362,295 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in Bank of America by 1.9% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 40,518,019 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,109,383,000 after buying an additional 746,756 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in Bank of America by 17.1% in the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 37,649,708 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,267,666,000 after buying an additional 5,484,219 shares during the period. Finally, California Public Employees Retirement System lifted its stake in Bank of America by 5.9% in the fourth quarter. California Public Employees Retirement System now owns 22,538,500 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $758,871,000 after buying an additional 1,250,096 shares during the period. 70.71% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on BAC. Jefferies Financial Group upped their target price on Bank of America from $36.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, April 8th. Erste Group Bank raised Bank of America from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Odeon Capital Group lowered Bank of America from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $33.90 target price on the stock. in a research report on Tuesday, January 16th. Morgan Stanley raised Bank of America from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price target for the company from $32.00 to $41.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 30th. Finally, UBS Group restated a “neutral” rating and issued a $40.00 price objective (up previously from $39.00) on shares of Bank of America in a research note on Thursday, April 4th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have issued a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Bank of America presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $38.70.

Bank of America Price Performance

NYSE BAC traded up $0.37 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $37.25. The company had a trading volume of 34,082,662 shares, compared to its average volume of 41,339,492. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $36.39 and a 200 day simple moving average of $33.01. Bank of America Co. has a 52 week low of $24.96 and a 52 week high of $38.49. The firm has a market capitalization of $291.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.89, a PEG ratio of 1.65 and a beta of 1.37. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.12, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.79.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 16th. The financial services provider reported $0.83 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.77 by $0.06. Bank of America had a net margin of 13.94% and a return on equity of 10.88%. The company had revenue of $25.82 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $25.49 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $0.94 earnings per share. Bank of America’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.7% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that Bank of America Co. will post 3.2 earnings per share for the current year.

Bank of America Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, June 28th. Investors of record on Friday, June 7th will be given a $0.24 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 7th. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.58%. Bank of America’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 33.22%.

About Bank of America

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides banking and financial products and services for individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, large corporations, and governments worldwide. It operates in four segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth & Investment Management (GWIM), Global Banking, and Global Markets.