Park National Corp OH Invests $217,000 in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN)

Park National Corp OH acquired a new position in Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor acquired 1,050 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock, valued at approximately $217,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of GRMN. FMR LLC increased its holdings in shares of Garmin by 40.8% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 3,775,154 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $664,540,000 after buying an additional 1,093,219 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its position in Garmin by 136.7% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 711,849 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $115,177,000 after acquiring an additional 411,084 shares in the last quarter. Montrusco Bolton Investments Inc. bought a new position in Garmin in the third quarter valued at $53,252,000. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in Garmin during the second quarter valued at about $45,999,000. Finally, Marshall Wace LLP lifted its stake in Garmin by 34.0% during the second quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 1,098,443 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $178,958,000 after purchasing an additional 278,990 shares during the last quarter. 81.60% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at Garmin

In related news, CFO Douglas G. Boessen sold 1,761 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $207.99, for a total transaction of $366,270.39. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now owns 27,612 shares in the company, valued at $5,743,019.88. This represents a 6.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Sean Biddlecombe sold 587 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, November 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $210.10, for a total value of $123,328.70. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 6,147 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,291,484.70. The trade was a 8.72 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 19.54% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently commented on GRMN shares. Morgan Stanley lowered Garmin from an “equal weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and reduced their price objective for the company from $155.00 to $138.00 in a research report on Monday, October 7th. Tigress Financial increased their price target on shares of Garmin from $215.00 to $265.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Barclays boosted their price objective on shares of Garmin from $133.00 to $158.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Garmin from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, September 12th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Garmin has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $171.00.

Garmin Stock Performance

Shares of GRMN stock opened at $211.25 on Thursday. Garmin Ltd. has a fifty-two week low of $119.15 and a fifty-two week high of $222.97. The company has a market capitalization of $40.57 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.81, a PEG ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 0.98. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $210.46 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $184.84.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $1.99 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.46 by $0.53. The company had revenue of $1.59 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.44 billion. Garmin had a net margin of 25.48% and a return on equity of 17.99%. The firm’s revenue was up 24.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $1.41 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Garmin Ltd. will post 7.01 earnings per share for the current year.

Garmin Profile

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.