Altria Group (NYSE:MO) Stock Price Down 0.4% – Time to Sell?

Altria Group, Inc. (NYSE:MO) was down 0.4% on Tuesday . The stock traded as low as $56.01 and last traded at $56.12. Approximately 1,227,782 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 87% from the average daily volume of 9,735,099 shares. The stock had previously closed at $56.34.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have issued reports on MO. Bank of America decreased their target price on shares of Altria Group from $57.00 to $53.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, October 15th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on shares of Altria Group from $54.00 to $60.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 1st. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their target price on shares of Altria Group from $52.00 to $60.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, November 1st. UBS Group lifted their target price on shares of Altria Group from $39.00 to $41.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a research note on Monday, September 9th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of Altria Group from $45.00 to $46.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 6th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $51.33.

Altria Group Stock Performance

The stock has a market cap of $94.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 9.46, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.18 and a beta of 0.64. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $51.72 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $49.51.

Altria Group (NYSE:MO) last released its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The company reported $1.38 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.35 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $6.26 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.33 billion. Altria Group had a net margin of 42.82% and a negative return on equity of 233.80%. The business’s revenue was up 18.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.28 EPS. As a group, research analysts predict that Altria Group, Inc. will post 5.11 earnings per share for the current year.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in MO. Covestor Ltd increased its holdings in shares of Altria Group by 33.4% during the 1st quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 1,047 shares of the company’s stock worth $46,000 after purchasing an additional 262 shares during the period. Bessemer Group Inc. raised its position in Altria Group by 45.5% in the first quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 65,405 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,854,000 after purchasing an additional 20,438 shares in the last quarter. Lake Street Advisors Group LLC raised its position in Altria Group by 61.9% in the first quarter. Lake Street Advisors Group LLC now owns 9,700 shares of the company’s stock worth $433,000 after purchasing an additional 3,707 shares in the last quarter. Crewe Advisors LLC acquired a new position in Altria Group in the first quarter worth about $67,000. Finally, LGT Group Foundation acquired a new position in Altria Group in the first quarter worth about $51,000. Institutional investors own 57.41% of the company’s stock.

About Altria Group

Altria Group, Inc, through its subsidiaries, manufactures and sells smokeable and oral tobacco products in the United States. The company offers cigarettes primarily under the Marlboro brand; large cigars and pipe tobacco under the Black & Mild brand; moist smokeless tobacco and snus products under the Copenhagen, Skoal, Red Seal, and Husky brands; oral nicotine pouches under the on! brand; and e-vapor products under the NJOY ACE brand.