Mountain Pacific Investment Advisers LLC Sells 1,536 Shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL)

Mountain Pacific Investment Advisers LLC cut its holdings in shares of Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL - Free Report) by 4.0% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 37,035 shares of the basic materials company's stock after selling 1,536 shares during the quarter. Mountain Pacific Investment Advisers LLC's holdings in Ecolab were worth $8,678,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of ECL. MassMutual Private Wealth & Trust FSB raised its position in shares of Ecolab by 3.4% during the fourth quarter. MassMutual Private Wealth & Trust FSB now owns 92,639 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $21,707,000 after buying an additional 3,080 shares during the last quarter. Corundum Group Inc. increased its stake in Ecolab by 47.9% during the fourth quarter. Corundum Group Inc. now owns 7,548 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $1,769,000 after acquiring an additional 2,444 shares during the period. UMB Bank n.a. raised its holdings in Ecolab by 1.6% in the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 54,640 shares of the basic materials company's stock valued at $12,803,000 after acquiring an additional 855 shares in the last quarter. Strong Tower Advisory Services lifted its position in shares of Ecolab by 6.5% in the 4th quarter. Strong Tower Advisory Services now owns 10,700 shares of the basic materials company's stock worth $2,507,000 after acquiring an additional 652 shares during the period. Finally, Sarasin & Partners LLP grew its holdings in shares of Ecolab by 1.5% during the 4th quarter. Sarasin & Partners LLP now owns 328,395 shares of the basic materials company's stock worth $76,950,000 after purchasing an additional 4,789 shares in the last quarter. 74.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages recently commented on ECL. UBS Group lowered Ecolab from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and set a $276.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Monday, November 4th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $306.00 to $294.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, January 10th. StockNews.com lowered shares of Ecolab from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 25th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued a "market perform" rating on shares of Ecolab in a research report on Friday, October 18th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on Ecolab from $260.00 to $300.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a report on Monday, November 18th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have given a buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Ecolab currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $277.47.

Ecolab Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:ECL traded up $3.46 during midday trading on Tuesday, reaching $240.88. The company's stock had a trading volume of 1,260,672 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,231,164. The business's fifty day simple moving average is $241.70 and its 200-day simple moving average is $245.63. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 1.30 and a quick ratio of 0.97. Ecolab Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $195.49 and a fifty-two week high of $262.61. The company has a market capitalization of $68.21 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.78, a P/E/G ratio of 2.63 and a beta of 1.13.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The basic materials company reported $1.83 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.82 by $0.01. Ecolab had a net margin of 13.05% and a return on equity of 22.12%. The firm had revenue of $4 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $4.03 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $1.54 EPS. The company's quarterly revenue was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Ecolab Inc. will post 6.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Ecolab Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 15th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, December 17th were paid a $0.65 dividend. This is a boost from Ecolab's previous quarterly dividend of $0.57. This represents a $2.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.08%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, December 17th. Ecolab's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 36.47%.

Insider Activity

In other Ecolab news, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 409,136 shares of the company's stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 31st. The shares were sold at an average price of $246.92, for a total transaction of $101,023,861.12. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 30,776,418 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,599,313,132.56. The trade was a 1.31 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Insiders have sold 834,566 shares of company stock valued at $205,225,417 over the last 90 days. 0.50% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Ecolab Company Profile

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.