First County Bank CT Decreases Stock Position in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI)

First County Bank CT reduced its position in Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) by 46.9% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 2,661 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after selling 2,348 shares during the period. First County Bank CT’s holdings in Crown Castle were worth $316,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Legal & General Group Plc raised its stake in Crown Castle by 1.1% during the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 6,177,250 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $603,518,000 after buying an additional 67,072 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its stake in Crown Castle by 5.0% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 5,002,934 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $593,498,000 after buying an additional 237,730 shares during the last quarter. National Bank of Canada FI raised its stake in Crown Castle by 10.7% during the 2nd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 4,035,561 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $387,333,000 after buying an additional 391,127 shares during the last quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP raised its stake in Crown Castle by 95.8% during the 2nd quarter. Cooke & Bieler LP now owns 2,578,932 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $251,962,000 after buying an additional 1,261,536 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Daiwa Securities Group Inc. raised its stake in Crown Castle by 4,097.8% during the 2nd quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 2,524,226 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $246,617,000 after buying an additional 2,464,094 shares during the last quarter. 90.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

CCI has been the subject of a number of research reports. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their target price on shares of Crown Castle from $100.00 to $105.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price objective on Crown Castle from $123.00 to $127.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on Crown Castle from $115.00 to $124.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, September 23rd. TD Cowen reduced their price objective on Crown Castle from $127.00 to $123.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on Crown Castle from $105.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Crown Castle has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $116.87.

Crown Castle Trading Up 0.9 %

Shares of Crown Castle stock opened at $105.42 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $45.81 billion, a P/E ratio of 37.38 and a beta of 0.86. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.43, a quick ratio of 0.54 and a current ratio of 0.54. The company has a fifty day moving average of $110.60 and a 200 day moving average of $106.75. Crown Castle Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $92.48 and a fifty-two week high of $120.92.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 16th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.70 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.73 by ($1.03). Crown Castle had a net margin of 18.59% and a return on equity of 20.98%. The company had revenue of $1.65 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.64 billion. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.77 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down .9% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Crown Castle Inc. will post 6.66 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Crown Castle Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, December 31st. Shareholders of record on Friday, December 13th will be issued a dividend of $1.565 per share. This represents a $6.26 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.94%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, December 13th. Crown Castle’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 221.99%.

Crown Castle Profile

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.