Capital Research Global Investors Sells 11,091,326 Shares of Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE)

Capital Research Global Investors decreased its position in Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE - Free Report) by 70.9% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 4,546,367 shares of the basic materials company's stock after selling 11,091,326 shares during the quarter. Capital Research Global Investors owned approximately 4.16% of Celanese worth $314,653,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of CE. Dodge & Cox raised its holdings in Celanese by 100.3% in the 4th quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 13,618,062 shares of the basic materials company's stock worth $942,506,000 after purchasing an additional 6,818,993 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. raised its stake in shares of Celanese by 105.0% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 3,969,284 shares of the basic materials company's stock worth $274,714,000 after buying an additional 2,033,025 shares during the period. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Celanese during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $222,815,000. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Celanese by 2.8% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,679,670 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $184,998,000 after acquiring an additional 73,498 shares during the period. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its holdings in Celanese by 5.2% in the 4th quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 1,688,619 shares of the basic materials company's stock worth $116,869,000 after acquiring an additional 82,860 shares in the last quarter. 98.87% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have weighed in on the stock. Evercore ISI dropped their price target on shares of Celanese from $85.00 to $75.00 and set an "in-line" rating for the company in a research report on Monday, March 24th. Alembic Global Advisors raised shares of Celanese from a "neutral" rating to an "overweight" rating and set a $70.00 target price for the company in a report on Monday, March 17th. Royal Bank of Canada cut Celanese from an "outperform" rating to a "sector perform" rating and decreased their price target for the company from $84.00 to $56.00 in a report on Thursday, February 20th. KeyCorp dropped their price objective on Celanese from $76.00 to $71.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research note on Monday, April 14th. Finally, Morgan Stanley decreased their target price on Celanese from $100.00 to $80.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, Celanese presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $61.33.

Celanese Trading Down 1.6 %

Shares of Celanese stock traded down $0.71 during trading on Friday, hitting $43.00. The stock had a trading volume of 703,793 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,005,950. Celanese Co. has a 12 month low of $36.29 and a 12 month high of $169.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.98, a current ratio of 1.34 and a quick ratio of 0.76. The firm's fifty day simple moving average is $50.03 and its 200-day simple moving average is $72.27. The stock has a market cap of $4.70 billion, a PE ratio of -3.10, a PEG ratio of 1.05 and a beta of 1.08.

Celanese (NYSE:CE - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 18th. The basic materials company reported $1.45 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.25 by $0.20. Celanese had a negative net margin of 14.81% and a positive return on equity of 12.86%. The business had revenue of $2.37 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.36 billion. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Celanese Co. will post 8.79 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Celanese Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, May 12th. Stockholders of record on Monday, April 28th will be paid a dividend of $0.03 per share. This represents a $0.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.28%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, April 28th. Celanese's dividend payout ratio is currently -0.86%.

Celanese Profile

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.