Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) Receives Average Rating of “Hold” from Brokerages

Shares of Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) have received an average rating of “Hold” from the sixteen ratings firms that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. Eleven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and five have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average twelve-month price target among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $114.88.

A number of brokerages have recently commented on CCI. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on Crown Castle from $103.00 to $105.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Argus downgraded Crown Castle from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, April 19th. Barclays upped their price target on Crown Castle from $111.00 to $112.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 23rd. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price target on Crown Castle from $115.00 to $100.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 19th. Finally, Raymond James reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $126.00 price target (up from $124.00) on shares of Crown Castle in a report on Friday, June 14th.

Crown Castle Stock Up 0.6 %

Shares of NYSE:CCI opened at $108.13 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.04, a current ratio of 0.43 and a quick ratio of 0.42. The firm has a market capitalization of $46.98 billion, a PE ratio of 33.79 and a beta of 0.83. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $100.07 and its two-hundred day moving average is $102.70. Crown Castle has a 1 year low of $84.72 and a 1 year high of $119.50.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 17th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.54 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $1.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.62 billion. Crown Castle had a net margin of 17.98% and a return on equity of 19.20%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 12.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $2.05 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Crown Castle will post 6.63 EPS for the current year.

Crown Castle Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, June 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 14th were given a $1.565 dividend. This represents a $6.26 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.79%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, June 14th. Crown Castle’s payout ratio is 195.63%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Crown Castle news, COO Michael Joseph Kavanagh sold 10,883 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, July 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $103.72, for a total value of $1,128,784.76. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 75,127 shares in the company, valued at $7,792,172.44. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. 0.39% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Fisher Asset Management LLC raised its position in Crown Castle by 16.2% in the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 4,547,032 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $523,773,000 after acquiring an additional 632,398 shares in the last quarter. Court Place Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Crown Castle in the fourth quarter valued at $201,000. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. grew its holdings in Crown Castle by 0.9% in the first quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. now owns 931,397 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $98,570,000 after purchasing an additional 8,136 shares during the last quarter. Global Assets Advisory LLC acquired a new stake in Crown Castle in the first quarter valued at $4,425,000. Finally, O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in Crown Castle by 30.4% in the first quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC now owns 35,805 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $3,789,000 after purchasing an additional 8,346 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 90.77% of the company’s stock.

About Crown Castle

Crown Castle owns, operates and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and approximately 90,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market. This nationwide portfolio of communications infrastructure connects cities and communities to essential data, technology and wireless service – bringing information, ideas and innovations to the people and businesses that need them.