Janney Montgomery Scott LLC Decreases Stock Holdings in Littelfuse, Inc. (NASDAQ:LFUS)

Janney Montgomery Scott LLC lowered its position in shares of Littelfuse, Inc. (NASDAQ:LFUS) by 3.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 1,743 shares of the technology company’s stock after selling 63 shares during the period. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC’s holdings in Littelfuse were worth $411,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its holdings in Littelfuse by 41.8% in the 3rd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 234 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $62,000 after purchasing an additional 69 shares in the last quarter. UMB Bank n.a. boosted its position in Littelfuse by 70.2% during the third quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 143 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $38,000 after acquiring an additional 59 shares during the last quarter. Procyon Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Littelfuse during the 3rd quarter worth about $211,000. Creative Planning raised its position in shares of Littelfuse by 32.0% in the 3rd quarter. Creative Planning now owns 3,567 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $946,000 after buying an additional 865 shares during the period. Finally, Cabot Wealth Management Inc. increased its position in Littelfuse by 1.9% during the 3rd quarter. Cabot Wealth Management Inc. now owns 5,454 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,447,000 after purchasing an additional 101 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 96.14% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Littelfuse

In other Littelfuse news, CAO Jeffrey G. Gorski sold 700 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $249.02, for a total transaction of $174,314.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 3,105 shares in the company, valued at $773,207.10. This represents a 18.40 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 2.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have weighed in on LFUS. Robert W. Baird decreased their price target on Littelfuse from $300.00 to $290.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Oppenheimer raised Littelfuse from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $310.00 price target on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 17th. StockNews.com cut Littelfuse from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 4th. Finally, Benchmark reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Littelfuse in a research note on Wednesday, January 29th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $280.00.

Littelfuse Trading Up 0.8 %

NASDAQ:LFUS opened at $234.72 on Tuesday. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $238.11 and its two-hundred day moving average is $248.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 3.61 and a quick ratio of 2.62. Littelfuse, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $222.73 and a fifty-two week high of $275.58. The stock has a market cap of $5.83 billion, a PE ratio of 52.16, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.05 and a beta of 1.26.

Littelfuse (NASDAQ:LFUS) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, January 28th. The technology company reported $2.04 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.04. Littelfuse had a net margin of 5.16% and a return on equity of 8.55%. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $2.02 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Littelfuse, Inc. will post 9.49 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Littelfuse Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 6th. Investors of record on Thursday, February 20th will be issued a dividend of $0.70 per share. This represents a $2.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.19%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, February 20th. Littelfuse’s dividend payout ratio is currently 62.22%.

About Littelfuse

Littelfuse, Inc designs, manufactures, and sells electronic components, modules, and subassemblies in the Americas, Asia-Pacific, and Europe. The company operates through Electronic, Transportation, and Industrial segments. The Electronics segment offers fuses and fuse accessories, positive temperature coefficient resettable fuses, electromechanical switches and interconnect solutions, polymer electrostatic discharge suppressors, varistors, reed switch based magnetic sensing products, and gas discharge tubes; and discrete transient voltage suppressor (TVS) diodes, TVS diode arrays, protection and switching thyristors, metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors and diodes, and insulated gate bipolar transistors.