Renaissance Technologies LLC Sells 34,500 Shares of OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC)

Renaissance Technologies LLC cut its stake in OceanFirst Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:OCFC) by 13.4% during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 223,752 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock after selling 34,500 shares during the quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC owned approximately 0.38% of OceanFirst Financial worth $3,555,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the stock. American Century Companies Inc. grew its stake in OceanFirst Financial by 20.8% in the 2nd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 956,320 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $15,196,000 after buying an additional 164,626 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in OceanFirst Financial by 3.1% in the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 3,475,107 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $57,027,000 after buying an additional 105,764 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of OceanFirst Financial by 6.8% in the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 1,046,061 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $18,160,000 after acquiring an additional 66,868 shares during the period. GSA Capital Partners LLP grew its stake in shares of OceanFirst Financial by 455.5% in the first quarter. GSA Capital Partners LLP now owns 71,704 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $1,177,000 after acquiring an additional 58,795 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hennessy Advisors Inc. increased its position in OceanFirst Financial by 36.7% during the fourth quarter. Hennessy Advisors Inc. now owns 205,000 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $3,559,000 after acquiring an additional 55,000 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 70.98% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Separately, Hovde Group boosted their price objective on shares of OceanFirst Financial from $19.50 to $21.50 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, September 20th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $18.90.

OceanFirst Financial Stock Performance

NASDAQ OCFC opened at $18.32 on Monday. OceanFirst Financial Corp. has a 1 year low of $12.01 and a 1 year high of $18.98. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.71 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a current ratio of 1.01, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $17.30 and its 200 day simple moving average is $16.07.

OceanFirst Financial (NASDAQ:OCFC) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 18th. The savings and loans company reported $0.39 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.42 by ($0.03). The business had revenue of $170.41 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $94.93 million. OceanFirst Financial had a net margin of 14.78% and a return on equity of 5.85%. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.46 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that OceanFirst Financial Corp. will post 1.58 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

OceanFirst Financial Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 16th. Investors of record on Monday, August 5th were given a dividend of $0.20 per share. This represents a $0.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.37%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, August 5th. OceanFirst Financial’s dividend payout ratio is 46.78%.

OceanFirst Financial Company Profile

OceanFirst Financial Corp. operates as the bank holding company for OceanFirst Bank N.A. that provides community banking services to retail and commercial customers. It accepts money market accounts, savings accounts, interest-bearing checking accounts, non-interest-bearing accounts, and time deposits, that includes brokered deposits to retail, government, and business customers.