Analysts Set Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) Price Target at $113.53

Shares of Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) have received an average recommendation of “Hold” from the sixteen analysts that are presently covering the stock, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Eleven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and five have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1-year price objective among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $113.53.

A number of research firms have recently commented on CCI. Raymond James restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $126.00 price objective (up from $124.00) on shares of Crown Castle in a research report on Friday, June 14th. TD Cowen raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $124.00 to $127.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 18th. Bank of America raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $110.00 to $115.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 13th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $103.00 to $105.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 23rd. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada raised their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $100.00 to $104.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 25th.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, COO Michael Joseph Kavanagh sold 10,883 shares of Crown Castle stock in a transaction on Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $103.72, for a total value of $1,128,784.76. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 75,127 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,792,172.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. 0.39% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in CCI. Pathway Financial Advisers LLC grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 2.4% during the 2nd quarter. Pathway Financial Advisers LLC now owns 3,869 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $376,000 after acquiring an additional 91 shares during the period. Prosperity Consulting Group LLC grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 4.4% during the 2nd quarter. Prosperity Consulting Group LLC now owns 2,262 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $221,000 after acquiring an additional 95 shares during the period. Granite Investment Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 0.5% during the 2nd quarter. Granite Investment Partners LLC now owns 19,439 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $1,899,000 after acquiring an additional 100 shares during the period. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 12.8% during the 1st quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 950 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $101,000 after acquiring an additional 108 shares during the period. Finally, Gilbert & Cook Inc. grew its stake in shares of Crown Castle by 3.7% during the 4th quarter. Gilbert & Cook Inc. now owns 3,083 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $355,000 after acquiring an additional 110 shares during the period. 90.77% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Crown Castle Price Performance

CCI stock opened at $112.40 on Friday. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $104.09 and a 200-day moving average of $103.03. The company has a current ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.43 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.04. Crown Castle has a 12 month low of $84.72 and a 12 month high of $119.50. The firm has a market capitalization of $48.85 billion, a P/E ratio of 35.13 and a beta of 0.83.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 17th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.58 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.54 by $0.04. Crown Castle had a net margin of 17.98% and a return on equity of 19.20%. The company had revenue of $1.63 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.62 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $2.05 earnings per share. Crown Castle’s revenue was down 12.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Crown Castle will post 6.64 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Crown Castle Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 30th. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 13th will be paid a dividend of $1.565 per share. This represents a $6.26 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.57%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, September 13th. Crown Castle’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 195.63%.

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.