Baillie Gifford & Co. Sells 96,461 Shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL)

Baillie Gifford & Co. reduced its position in Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) by 8.7% in the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 1,017,972 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 96,461 shares during the period. Baillie Gifford & Co.’s holdings in Ecolab were worth $259,919,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Farther Finance Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in Ecolab by 32.7% in the 3rd quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 2,356 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $602,000 after buying an additional 581 shares during the period. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. grew its position in shares of Ecolab by 15.9% during the third quarter. First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. now owns 6,224 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,589,000 after purchasing an additional 855 shares in the last quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC raised its stake in Ecolab by 84.3% during the 1st quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC now owns 13,415 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $3,098,000 after purchasing an additional 6,137 shares during the period. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its holdings in Ecolab by 50.9% in the 2nd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 4,922 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,171,000 after purchasing an additional 1,660 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Tidal Investments LLC boosted its stake in Ecolab by 19.1% in the 1st quarter. Tidal Investments LLC now owns 21,198 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $4,895,000 after purchasing an additional 3,393 shares during the period. 74.91% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

ECL has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $240.00 to $263.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Citigroup upgraded shares of Ecolab from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and decreased their price target for the stock from $267.00 to $265.00 in a research note on Wednesday, July 31st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on Ecolab from $228.00 to $255.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Jefferies Financial Group upgraded Ecolab from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $235.00 to $310.00 in a research report on Friday, October 18th. Finally, Bank of America upgraded Ecolab from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price target for the company from $251.00 to $272.00 in a report on Wednesday, July 31st. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Ecolab presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $277.20.

Ecolab Price Performance

Ecolab stock opened at $250.56 on Tuesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $70.95 billion, a PE ratio of 35.14, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.49 and a beta of 1.13. Ecolab Inc. has a 12-month low of $177.16 and a 12-month high of $262.61. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $252.26 and a 200-day moving average price of $243.27. The company has a current ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 0.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The basic materials company reported $1.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.82 by $0.01. Ecolab had a return on equity of 22.12% and a net margin of 13.05%. The business had revenue of $4 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.03 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.54 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Ecolab Inc. will post 6.66 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 65,015 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $243.80, for a total transaction of $15,850,657.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 30,388,741 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,408,775,055.80. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other Ecolab news, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 65,015 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $243.80, for a total transaction of $15,850,657.00. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 30,388,741 shares in the company, valued at $7,408,775,055.80. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 409,136 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 31st. The stock was sold at an average price of $246.92, for a total value of $101,023,861.12. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 30,776,418 shares in the company, valued at $7,599,313,132.56. The trade was a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 478,355 shares of company stock worth $117,922,965 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.04% of the company’s stock.

About Ecolab

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.