Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. Reduces Stock Position in ASML Holding (NASDAQ:ASML)

Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. lessened its stake in shares of ASML Holding (NASDAQ:ASML) by 0.1% during the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 45,740 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock after selling 56 shares during the quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co.’s holdings in ASML were worth $46,800,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Fisher Asset Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of ASML by 2.0% in the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 4,967,958 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $3,760,348,000 after buying an additional 95,795 shares during the last quarter. Jennison Associates LLC boosted its holdings in shares of ASML by 50.0% in the first quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 1,719,153 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,668,386,000 after buying an additional 572,996 shares during the last quarter. GQG Partners LLC boosted its holdings in shares of ASML by 21.6% in the first quarter. GQG Partners LLC now owns 1,657,878 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,608,921,000 after buying an additional 294,784 shares during the last quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp boosted its holdings in shares of ASML by 15.4% in the second quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,282,396 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,311,545,000 after buying an additional 170,992 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC boosted its holdings in shares of ASML by 18.9% in the first quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 1,220,210 shares of the semiconductor company’s stock worth $1,184,173,000 after buying an additional 194,357 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 26.07% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms recently issued reports on ASML. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on shares of ASML from $1,150.00 to $1,185.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, June 17th. Morgan Stanley downgraded shares of ASML from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, September 20th. Susquehanna lifted their price target on shares of ASML from $1,200.00 to $1,300.00 and gave the company a “positive” rating in a report on Thursday, July 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of ASML from $1,172.00 to $1,202.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, July 18th. Finally, UBS Group downgraded shares of ASML from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 4th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, nine have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $1,147.80.

ASML Trading Down 1.3 %

ASML stock opened at $841.54 on Monday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 1.52 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.31. ASML Holding has a twelve month low of $563.99 and a twelve month high of $1,110.09. The stock has a market capitalization of $332.06 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 42.98, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.97 and a beta of 1.49. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $855.83 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $933.38.

ASML (NASDAQ:ASML) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 17th. The semiconductor company reported $4.01 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.87 by $0.14. ASML had a net margin of 26.50% and a return on equity of 49.93%. The business had revenue of $6.24 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $6 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $5.37 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was down 9.5% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that ASML Holding will post 20.38 earnings per share for the current year.

ASML Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, August 7th. Stockholders of record on Monday, July 29th were paid a dividend of $1.8732 per share. This is a positive change from ASML’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.34. This represents a $7.49 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.89%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, July 29th. ASML’s payout ratio is currently 28.50%.

ASML Company Profile

ASML Holding N.V. develops, produces, markets, sells, and services advanced semiconductor equipment systems for chipmakers. It offers advanced semiconductor equipment systems, including lithography, metrology, and inspection systems. The company also provides extreme ultraviolet lithography systems; and deep ultraviolet lithography systems comprising immersion and dry lithography solutions to manufacture various range of semiconductor nodes and technologies.