Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC Raises Holdings in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN)

Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC lifted its stake in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) by 12.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 7,428 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after purchasing an additional 819 shares during the quarter. Wealthcare Advisory Partners LLC’s holdings in Garmin were worth $1,532,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Outlook Wealth Advisors LLC raised its holdings in shares of Garmin by 2.6% in the fourth quarter. Outlook Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,332 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $481,000 after buying an additional 58 shares during the last quarter. Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. raised its stake in Garmin by 0.9% in the 3rd quarter. Sumitomo Life Insurance Co. now owns 6,686 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $1,177,000 after acquiring an additional 61 shares during the last quarter. Tealwood Asset Management Inc. lifted its position in Garmin by 0.5% during the 4th quarter. Tealwood Asset Management Inc. now owns 15,405 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $3,177,000 after acquiring an additional 75 shares during the period. Buckingham Capital Management Inc. grew its stake in Garmin by 0.7% during the 3rd quarter. Buckingham Capital Management Inc. now owns 11,715 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $2,062,000 after purchasing an additional 80 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Brighton Jones LLC increased its holdings in shares of Garmin by 5.8% in the second quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 1,522 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $248,000 after purchasing an additional 83 shares during the period. 81.60% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on the company. Morgan Stanley lowered Garmin from an “equal weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $155.00 to $138.00 in a research report on Monday, October 7th. Tigress Financial increased their price objective on shares of Garmin from $215.00 to $265.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Garmin from $133.00 to $158.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $171.00.

Garmin Stock Performance

GRMN opened at $215.50 on Friday. The company has a fifty day moving average of $211.45 and a two-hundred day moving average of $187.30. The stock has a market capitalization of $41.38 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.35, a PEG ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 0.98. Garmin Ltd. has a fifty-two week low of $119.15 and a fifty-two week high of $222.97.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $1.99 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.46 by $0.53. Garmin had a return on equity of 17.99% and a net margin of 25.48%. The firm had revenue of $1.59 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.44 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.41 EPS. Garmin’s revenue for the quarter was up 24.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Garmin Ltd. will post 7.01 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Sean Biddlecombe sold 587 shares of Garmin stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $210.10, for a total value of $123,328.70. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 6,147 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,291,484.70. The trade was a 8.72 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Douglas G. Boessen sold 1,761 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $207.99, for a total value of $366,270.39. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 27,612 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,743,019.88. This represents a 6.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 19.54% of the company’s stock.

About Garmin

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.