Chesley Taft & Associates LLC Trims Stake in Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (NASDAQ:WBA)

Chesley Taft & Associates LLC trimmed its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (NASDAQ:WBA) by 53.8% during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 17,626 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock after selling 20,529 shares during the period. Chesley Taft & Associates LLC’s holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance were worth $213,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Capital World Investors lifted its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance by 57.5% during the first quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 29,061,021 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $630,334,000 after buying an additional 10,612,373 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance by 10.4% during the fourth quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 6,519,845 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $170,233,000 after buying an additional 613,847 shares during the period. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. lifted its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance by 6.1% during the second quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Holdings Inc. now owns 2,718,659 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $32,882,000 after buying an additional 156,484 shares during the period. Schroder Investment Management Group lifted its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance by 1.2% during the fourth quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 2,249,654 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $58,738,000 after buying an additional 27,634 shares during the period. Finally, Ariel Investments LLC lifted its holdings in Walgreens Boots Alliance by 25.3% during the first quarter. Ariel Investments LLC now owns 1,839,987 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $39,909,000 after buying an additional 371,386 shares during the period. 58.59% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Trading Up 0.9 %

Shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance stock traded up $0.10 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $11.02. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 930,361 shares, compared to its average volume of 15,415,779. Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. has a 1-year low of $10.19 and a 1-year high of $27.05. The business has a fifty day moving average of $12.45 and a 200 day moving average of $16.89. The company has a market capitalization of $9.51 billion, a PE ratio of -1.62, a P/E/G ratio of 0.73 and a beta of 0.72. The company has a quick ratio of 0.31, a current ratio of 0.65 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49.

Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ:WBA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, June 27th. The pharmacy operator reported $0.63 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.68 by ($0.05). The firm had revenue of $36.40 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $35.94 billion. Walgreens Boots Alliance had a negative net margin of 3.99% and a positive return on equity of 12.63%. Walgreens Boots Alliance’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $1.00 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. will post 2.87 EPS for the current year.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 12th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, August 21st will be given a $0.25 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, August 21st. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 9.07%. Walgreens Boots Alliance’s payout ratio is currently -14.84%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Truist Financial reduced their price target on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $20.00 to $13.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, June 28th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $30.00 to $20.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, July 1st. Barclays cut their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $11.00 to $7.00 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Morgan Stanley cut their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $13.00 to $9.00 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, June 28th. Finally, UBS Group cut their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $17.00 to $12.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, July 3rd. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Walgreens Boots Alliance has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $16.86.

About Walgreens Boots Alliance

Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc operates as a healthcare, pharmacy, and retail company in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and internationally. It operates through three segments: U.S. Retail Pharmacy, International, and U.S. Healthcare. The U.S. Retail Pharmacy segment engages in operation of the retail drugstores, health and wellness services, specialty, and home delivery pharmacy services, which offers health and wellness, beauty, personal care and consumables, and general merchandise.