W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) Shares Purchased by Baron Wealth Management LLC

Baron Wealth Management LLC increased its position in shares of W. R. Berkley Co. (NYSE:WRB) by 48.0% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 7,379 shares of the insurance provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 2,394 shares during the period. Baron Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in W. R. Berkley were worth $419,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its stake in W. R. Berkley by 0.8% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 24,439,361 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $2,161,417,000 after acquiring an additional 195,763 shares in the last quarter. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC boosted its stake in W. R. Berkley by 0.7% in the second quarter. Kayne Anderson Rudnick Investment Management LLC now owns 7,553,875 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $593,584,000 after acquiring an additional 54,530 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in W. R. Berkley by 211.3% in the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 3,674,171 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $208,436,000 after acquiring an additional 2,493,758 shares in the last quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. boosted its stake in W. R. Berkley by 3.5% in the second quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. now owns 2,698,311 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $197,838,000 after acquiring an additional 92,242 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its stake in W. R. Berkley by 7.4% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,037,599 shares of the insurance provider’s stock valued at $160,128,000 after acquiring an additional 139,588 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 68.82% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on WRB shares. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of W. R. Berkley from $67.00 to $69.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 22nd. StockNews.com raised shares of W. R. Berkley from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 12th. Bank of America upped their target price on shares of W. R. Berkley from $73.00 to $76.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 22nd. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on shares of W. R. Berkley from $57.00 to $63.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 22nd. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group increased their price target on shares of W. R. Berkley from $53.00 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 9th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, W. R. Berkley currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $63.08.

W. R. Berkley Trading Up 0.1 %

Shares of WRB opened at $60.83 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 0.36, a quick ratio of 0.36 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $58.46 and its two-hundred day moving average is $56.21. W. R. Berkley Co. has a twelve month low of $45.75 and a twelve month high of $61.96. The firm has a market capitalization of $23.18 billion, a P/E ratio of 15.60, a PEG ratio of 1.21 and a beta of 0.62.

W. R. Berkley (NYSE:WRB) last released its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 21st. The insurance provider reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.92 by $0.01. The business had revenue of $2.93 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.93 billion. W. R. Berkley had a net margin of 11.96% and a return on equity of 20.41%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 10.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.90 earnings per share. On average, research analysts predict that W. R. Berkley Co. will post 3.96 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

W. R. Berkley Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 30th. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 23rd were given a $0.08 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, September 23rd. This represents a $0.32 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.53%. W. R. Berkley’s dividend payout ratio is presently 8.21%.

About W. R. Berkley

W. R. Berkley Corporation, an insurance holding company, operates as a commercial lines writers worldwide. It operates in two segments, Insurance and Reinsurance & Monoline Excess. The Insurance segment underwrites commercial insurance business, including excess and surplus lines, admitted lines, and specialty personal lines.