1,096 Shares in Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) Purchased by FIDELIS iM LLC

FIDELIS iM LLC purchased a new stake in Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) during the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund purchased 1,096 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock, valued at approximately $255,000. Apple comprises about 0.1% of FIDELIS iM LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 20th largest holding.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. grew its position in Apple by 0.5% during the third quarter. 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 9,654 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $2,249,000 after buying an additional 45 shares during the period. Carolina Wealth Advisors LLC increased its holdings in Apple by 1.3% in the 3rd quarter. Carolina Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 3,489 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $813,000 after acquiring an additional 46 shares in the last quarter. Verus Financial Partners Inc. lifted its holdings in Apple by 0.3% during the second quarter. Verus Financial Partners Inc. now owns 16,929 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock valued at $3,566,000 after purchasing an additional 48 shares in the last quarter. Brown Financial Advisory increased its stake in shares of Apple by 3.8% during the second quarter. Brown Financial Advisory now owns 1,364 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $287,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Core Wealth Management Inc. boosted its holdings in Apple by 1.7% in the 2nd quarter. Core Wealth Management Inc. now owns 2,968 shares of the iPhone maker’s stock worth $625,000 after buying an additional 50 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 67.73% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on AAPL. Needham & Company LLC reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $260.00 price target on shares of Apple in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. UBS Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $236.00 target price on shares of Apple in a report on Monday, December 2nd. Jefferies Financial Group lowered shares of Apple from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $205.00 to $212.92 in a research note on Monday, October 7th. KeyCorp lowered shares of Apple from a “sector weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and set a $200.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Wedbush increased their price objective on shares of Apple from $300.00 to $325.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 26th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating, twenty-three have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Apple currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $237.64.

Apple Stock Performance

Shares of AAPL stock opened at $242.21 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.51, a current ratio of 0.87 and a quick ratio of 0.83. The firm has a market cap of $3.66 trillion, a P/E ratio of 39.84, a PEG ratio of 2.41 and a beta of 1.20. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $239.32 and its two-hundred day moving average is $229.57. Apple Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $164.07 and a fifty-two week high of $260.10.

Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The iPhone maker reported $1.64 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.60 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $94.93 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $94.52 billion. Apple had a net margin of 23.97% and a return on equity of 152.94%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $1.46 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Apple Inc. will post 7.43 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Apple Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, November 14th. Stockholders of record on Monday, November 11th were given a dividend of $0.25 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, November 8th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.41%. Apple’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 16.45%.

Insider Activity at Apple

In other Apple news, COO Jeffrey E. Williams sold 100,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $249.97, for a total transaction of $24,997,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 389,944 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $97,474,301.68. The trade was a 20.41 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Chris Kondo sold 4,130 shares of Apple stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $228.87, for a total transaction of $945,233.10. Following the sale, the insider now owns 15,419 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,528,946.53. This represents a 21.13 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.06% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

About Apple

Apple Inc designs, manufactures, and markets smartphones, personal computers, tablets, wearables, and accessories worldwide. The company offers iPhone, a line of smartphones; Mac, a line of personal computers; iPad, a line of multi-purpose tablets; and wearables, home, and accessories comprising AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod.