Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. Sells 4,683 Shares of Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL)

Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. reduced its stake in shares of Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL - Free Report) by 5.2% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 84,913 shares of the energy company's stock after selling 4,683 shares during the period. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc.'s holdings in Shell were worth $5,320,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. FMR LLC raised its position in shares of Shell by 5.2% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 65,298,943 shares of the energy company's stock valued at $4,306,465,000 after buying an additional 3,255,347 shares during the last quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its stake in Shell by 2.1% during the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 24,530,647 shares of the energy company's stock worth $1,617,796,000 after buying an additional 507,311 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. grew its stake in Shell by 0.9% during the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 5,972,945 shares of the energy company's stock worth $408,430,000 after buying an additional 55,637 shares during the last quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. grew its stake in shares of Shell by 8.7% during the third quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. now owns 5,282,868 shares of the energy company's stock valued at $348,405,000 after purchasing an additional 422,329 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Holocene Advisors LP grew its stake in shares of Shell by 29.8% during the third quarter. Holocene Advisors LP now owns 3,773,617 shares of the energy company's stock valued at $248,870,000 after purchasing an additional 866,954 shares during the last quarter. 28.60% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have issued reports on SHEL. Piper Sandler reduced their price objective on shares of Shell from $82.00 to $72.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Shell from a "peer perform" rating to an "outperform" rating and set a $80.00 target price on the stock in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company cut their target price on shares of Shell from $86.00 to $82.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 31st. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Shell from an "equal weight" rating to an "overweight" rating and increased their target price for the stock from $66.50 to $79.80 in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. Finally, UBS Group upgraded shares of Shell from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Wednesday, January 8th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and three have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Buy" and an average price target of $79.11.

Shell Stock Down 0.3 %

Shares of NYSE:SHEL traded down $0.22 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $67.16. 2,934,808 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,173,529. Shell plc has a fifty-two week low of $60.15 and a fifty-two week high of $74.61. The company has a quick ratio of 1.10, a current ratio of 1.35 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $64.42 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $67.00. The firm has a market cap of $205.33 billion, a PE ratio of 13.38, a P/E/G ratio of 0.98 and a beta of 0.54.

Shell (NYSE:SHEL - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The energy company reported $1.20 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.74 by ($0.54). Shell had a net margin of 5.57% and a return on equity of 12.75%. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Shell plc will post 7.46 earnings per share for the current year.

Shell Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, February 14th will be paid a $0.716 dividend. This is a positive change from Shell's previous quarterly dividend of $0.69. This represents a $2.86 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.26%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 14th. Shell's payout ratio is presently 54.78%.

About Shell

Shell plc operates as an energy and petrochemical company Europe, Asia, Oceania, Africa, the United States, and Rest of the Americas. The company operates through Integrated Gas, Upstream, Marketing, Chemicals and Products, and Renewables and Energy Solutions segments. It explores for and extracts crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids; markets and transports oil and gas; produces gas-to-liquids fuels and other products; and operates upstream and midstream infrastructure to deliver gas to market.