Assenagon Asset Management S.A. Grows Position in The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC)

Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its position in shares of The Toro Company (NYSE:TTC - Free Report) by 294.4% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 24,652 shares of the company's stock after purchasing an additional 18,401 shares during the quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A.'s holdings in Toro were worth $1,975,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Speece Thorson Capital Group Inc. boosted its stake in Toro by 24.5% during the third quarter. Speece Thorson Capital Group Inc. now owns 144,438 shares of the company's stock valued at $12,527,000 after buying an additional 28,453 shares during the last quarter. PEAK6 Investments LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Toro during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $1,248,000. Benjamin Edwards Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Toro by 6,995.4% during the 3rd quarter. Benjamin Edwards Inc. now owns 74,005 shares of the company's stock worth $6,418,000 after acquiring an additional 72,962 shares in the last quarter. Raymond James & Associates boosted its position in shares of Toro by 5.7% during the 3rd quarter. Raymond James & Associates now owns 278,700 shares of the company's stock valued at $24,172,000 after acquiring an additional 14,950 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Eagle Asset Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Toro in the third quarter valued at $1,261,000. 87.95% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, Raymond James lowered their price target on Toro from $100.00 to $95.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $93.75.

Toro Stock Up 2.8 %

Shares of Toro stock traded up $2.36 during trading on Thursday, reaching $86.51. The company's stock had a trading volume of 655,285 shares, compared to its average volume of 733,306. The Toro Company has a 1-year low of $76.95 and a 1-year high of $100.93. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $83.18 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $86.13. The company has a quick ratio of 0.74, a current ratio of 1.81 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.59. The company has a market cap of $8.75 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.57 and a beta of 0.72.

Toro (NYSE:TTC - Get Free Report) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $0.95 EPS for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.95. The firm had revenue of $1.08 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.09 billion. Toro had a return on equity of 27.25% and a net margin of 9.14%. Toro's revenue for the quarter was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.71 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts forecast that The Toro Company will post 4.41 earnings per share for the current year.

Toro Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, January 13th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 23rd were issued a dividend of $0.38 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 23rd. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.76%. This is a boost from Toro's previous quarterly dividend of $0.36. Toro's dividend payout ratio is presently 37.91%.

Toro announced that its board has authorized a stock repurchase plan on Tuesday, December 10th that permits the company to repurchase 4,000,000 shares. This repurchase authorization permits the company to reacquire shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company's board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

About Toro

The Toro Company designs, manufactures, markets, and sells professional turf maintenance equipment and services. It operates through two segments: Professional and Residential. The Professional segment offers turf and landscape equipment products, including sports fields and grounds mowing and maintenance equipment, golf course mowing and maintenance equipment, landscape contractor mowing equipment, landscape creation and renovation equipment, and other maintenance equipment; rental, specialty, and underground construction equipment, such as horizontal directional drills, walk and ride trenchers, stand-on skid steers, vacuum excavators, stump grinders, turf renovation products, asset locators, pipe rehabilitation solutions, materials handling equipment, and other after-market tools; and snow and ice management equipment, such as snowplows, as well as stand-on snow and ice removal equipment, such as snowplow, snow brush, and snow thrower attachments, salt and sand spreaders, and related parts and accessories for light and medium duty trucks, utility task vehicles, skid steers, and front-end loaders.