Reliance (NYSE:RS) Stock Rating Upgraded by Barclays

Reliance (NYSE:RS) was upgraded by equities research analysts at Barclays from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating in a report issued on Thursday, FinViz reports. The brokerage presently has a $507.00 price target on the industrial products company’s stock, up from their prior price target of $445.00. Barclays‘s price target would indicate a potential upside of 17.82% from the stock’s previous close.

A number of other analysts have also recently weighed in on RS. Citigroup raised their price objective on shares of Reliance from $420.00 to $460.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 6th. Weiss Ratings cut shares of Reliance from a “buy (b)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 28th. Wall Street Zen raised shares of Reliance from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Saturday, October 31st. BMO Capital Markets lifted their price target on shares of Reliance from $390.00 to $415.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Monday, July 27th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of Reliance from $400.00 to $420.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 28th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, two have assigned a Buy rating, six have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $415.50.

Reliance Trading Up 0.7%

NYSE:RS opened at $430.31 on Thursday. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $407.26 and a 200-day simple moving average of $372.51. The stock has a market cap of $21.92 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.06, a P/E/G ratio of 0.85 and a beta of 0.95. Reliance has a 1 year low of $263.12 and a 1 year high of $454.93. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.21, a quick ratio of 2.22 and a current ratio of 4.12.

Reliance (NYSE:RS) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, October 21st. The industrial products company reported $8.02 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $6.83 by $1.19. The firm had revenue of $5.21 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.74 billion. Reliance had a return on equity of 15.31% and a net margin of 6.38%. The firm’s revenue was up 42.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.64 earnings per share. As a group, analysts anticipate that Reliance will post 26.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Reliance

In other Reliance news, COO Stephen Koch sold 8,334 shares of Reliance stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, October 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $430.87, for a total value of $3,590,870.58. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer directly owned 8,209 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,537,011.83. This trade represents a 50.38% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 0.40% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Reliance

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of RS. XXEC Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Reliance during the second quarter worth $127,493,000. BlackRock Inc. acquired a new position in Reliance in the 2nd quarter valued at $2,171,081,000. Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new position in Reliance during the 2nd quarter worth $176,913,000. William Blair Investment Management LLC purchased a new position in Reliance during the 2nd quarter worth $142,900,000. Finally, Advisors Asset Management Inc. purchased a new position in Reliance during the 3rd quarter worth $135,760,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.26% of the company’s stock.

About Reliance

Reliance, Inc. is a metal service center company that distributes metals and provides processing services to customers across a range of industries. Its products include carbon steel, stainless steel, aluminum, alloy steel, brass, copper and other metals. The company processes materials to customer specifications through services such as cutting, sawing, slitting, machining, forming and laser, plasma or waterjet cutting. These services help customers prepare metal for use in manufacturing, construction, transportation, energy and other applications.