Scorpio Tankers Inc. $STNG Shares Sold by Principal Financial Group Inc.

Principal Financial Group Inc. cut its stake in shares of Scorpio Tankers Inc. (NYSE:STNG) by 10.4% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 104,518 shares of the shipping company’s stock after selling 12,195 shares during the period. Principal Financial Group Inc. owned approximately 0.20% of Scorpio Tankers worth $7,803,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its holdings in shares of Scorpio Tankers by 2.1% in the fourth quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 3,005,276 shares of the shipping company’s stock valued at $152,757,000 after purchasing an additional 60,401 shares during the period. Renaissance Technologies LLC grew its position in Scorpio Tankers by 12.6% in the 4th quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 1,223,015 shares of the shipping company’s stock valued at $62,166,000 after buying an additional 137,000 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its position in Scorpio Tankers by 7.6% in the 1st quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 918,223 shares of the shipping company’s stock valued at $68,555,000 after buying an additional 64,511 shares during the last quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership increased its stake in Scorpio Tankers by 68.3% in the 3rd quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 806,049 shares of the shipping company’s stock valued at $45,179,000 after buying an additional 326,973 shares during the period. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC increased its stake in Scorpio Tankers by 8.8% in the 3rd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 699,040 shares of the shipping company’s stock valued at $39,181,000 after buying an additional 56,367 shares during the period. 54.64% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

STNG has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Zacks Research upgraded shares of Scorpio Tankers from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 14th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c)” rating on shares of Scorpio Tankers in a report on Thursday, June 18th. Evercore restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $94.00 price objective on shares of Scorpio Tankers in a research report on Wednesday. Bank of America lowered Scorpio Tankers from a “buy” rating to an “underperform” rating and lowered their price objective for the company from $100.00 to $78.00 in a report on Tuesday, June 30th. Finally, Morgan Stanley set a $82.00 target price on Scorpio Tankers and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 9th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have issued a Buy rating, four have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Scorpio Tankers presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $88.14.

Scorpio Tankers Stock Performance

NYSE:STNG opened at $79.34 on Monday. The company has a quick ratio of 13.87, a current ratio of 13.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. Scorpio Tankers Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $43.40 and a fifty-two week high of $87.39. The stock has a market cap of $4.00 billion, a PE ratio of 7.80 and a beta of -0.24. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $77.18 and its 200-day simple moving average is $73.36.

Scorpio Tankers (NYSE:STNG) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 6th. The shipping company reported $3.02 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.79 by $0.23. The firm had revenue of $312.86 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $286.81 million. Scorpio Tankers had a net margin of 48.44% and a return on equity of 11.72%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 46.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $1.03 earnings per share. Analysts expect that Scorpio Tankers Inc. will post 12.15 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Scorpio Tankers Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 29th were paid a dividend of $0.45 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, May 29th. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.3%. Scorpio Tankers’s payout ratio is 17.70%.

About Scorpio Tankers

Scorpio Tankers Inc (NYSE: STNG) is an independent provider of marine transportation services, specializing in the carriage of refined petroleum products. The company’s core operations focus on moving clean petroleum cargoes—such as gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and naphtha—on a global scale. By catering to both spot and time charter markets, Scorpio Tankers enables energy companies, refiners and traders to manage their supply chains with flexibility and reliability.

The company’s fleet is composed of modern, eco-designed product tankers, including medium range (MR) and long range (LR) vessels.