Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX) Trading 2.3% Higher After Analyst Upgrade

Freeport-McMoRan Inc. (NYSE:FCX)’s stock price shot up 2.3% during mid-day trading on Thursday after Royal Bank Of Canada raised their price target on the stock from $73.00 to $85.00. Royal Bank Of Canada currently has a sector perform rating on the stock. Freeport-McMoRan traded as high as $71.58 and last traded at $70.84. 10,953,326 shares traded hands during mid-day trading, a decline of 35% from the average daily volume of 16,725,221 shares. The stock had previously closed at $69.24.

Several other equities research analysts have also recently weighed in on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group restated a “buy” rating on shares of Freeport-McMoRan in a research report on Thursday, September 10th. Sanford C. Bernstein lowered their price objective on shares of Freeport-McMoRan from $50.00 to $47.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, September 9th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price objective on shares of Freeport-McMoRan from $76.00 to $80.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 21st. BMO Capital Markets restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $78.00 target price on shares of Freeport-McMoRan in a report on Thursday, July 23rd. Finally, Weiss Ratings raised shares of Freeport-McMoRan from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a report on Friday, July 31st. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have given a Buy rating and four have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $70.29.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Freeport-McMoRan news, Director Lydia H. Kennard sold 3,798 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $79.11, for a total transaction of $300,459.78. Following the transaction, the director owned 122,702 shares in the company, valued at $9,706,955.22. The trade was a 3.00% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CAO Stephen T. Higgins sold 14,277 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, August 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $69.50, for a total transaction of $992,251.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 54,618 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,795,951. This represents a 20.72% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 110,398 shares of company stock worth $8,387,271. 0.73% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Freeport-McMoRan

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FCX. U S Wealth Group LLC. bought a new stake in Freeport-McMoRan in the second quarter worth about $681,000. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company boosted its position in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 4.6% during the second quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 2,687,524 shares of the natural resource company’s stock valued at $169,018,000 after buying an additional 117,888 shares during the period. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 2.9% during the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 54,572 shares of the natural resource company’s stock valued at $3,432,000 after buying an additional 1,552 shares during the last quarter. MCF Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 15.8% during the second quarter. MCF Advisors LLC now owns 8,162 shares of the natural resource company’s stock valued at $513,000 after buying an additional 1,115 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Engineers Gate Manager LP raised its holdings in shares of Freeport-McMoRan by 12.1% in the second quarter. Engineers Gate Manager LP now owns 692,631 shares of the natural resource company’s stock worth $43,560,000 after buying an additional 74,896 shares during the period. 80.77% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Freeport-McMoRan Stock Performance

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.25, a current ratio of 2.07 and a quick ratio of 0.92. The stock has a market capitalization of $101.73 billion, a PE ratio of 34.90, a P/E/G ratio of 0.68 and a beta of 1.41. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $68.22 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $64.76.

Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE:FCX) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 23rd. The natural resource company reported $0.74 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.62 by $0.12. The company had revenue of $7.03 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $6.62 billion. Freeport-McMoRan had a return on equity of 10.63% and a net margin of 11.39%.Freeport-McMoRan’s revenue was down 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.54 EPS. Research analysts expect that Freeport-McMoRan Inc. will post 2.82 EPS for the current year.

Freeport-McMoRan Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 3rd. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, July 15th were paid a dividend of $0.075 per share. This represents a $0.30 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, July 15th. Freeport-McMoRan’s payout ratio is currently 14.78%.

About Freeport-McMoRan

Freeport-McMoRan Inc is a global mining company focused primarily on the exploration, development and production of copper, gold and molybdenum. Copper is its principal product and is used in electrical wiring, construction, transportation, industrial equipment and renewable-energy technologies. The company also produces gold as a byproduct of its copper operations and molybdenum, an alloying metal used in steelmaking and other industrial applications.

Freeport-McMoRan operates major mining and processing assets in North America, South America and Indonesia.