Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund Buys 37,940 Shares of Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT)

Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund increased its stake in shares of Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT) by 33.2% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 152,175 shares of the aerospace company’s stock after acquiring an additional 37,940 shares during the period. Illinois Municipal Retirement Fund’s holdings in Textron were worth $12,238,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Metis Global Partners LLC raised its stake in Textron by 12.8% in the third quarter. Metis Global Partners LLC now owns 10,189 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $796,000 after buying an additional 1,158 shares during the period. LSV Asset Management raised its stake in Textron by 7.6% in the third quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 3,271,771 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $255,656,000 after buying an additional 230,560 shares during the period. Deutsche Bank AG raised its stake in Textron by 36.9% in the third quarter. Deutsche Bank AG now owns 542,193 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $42,367,000 after buying an additional 146,055 shares during the period. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd raised its stake in Textron by 13.2% in the fourth quarter. AustralianSuper Pty Ltd now owns 98,773 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $7,943,000 after buying an additional 11,510 shares during the period. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC raised its stake in Textron by 269.1% in the fourth quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 20,896 shares of the aerospace company’s stock valued at $1,680,000 after buying an additional 15,235 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 86.03% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently commented on TXT. Citigroup upped their target price on Textron from $104.00 to $111.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 4th. UBS Group upped their target price on Textron from $77.00 to $81.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday, January 26th. Bank of America raised Textron from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $85.00 to $105.00 in a research report on Friday, March 8th. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on Textron from $103.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 16th. Finally, StockNews.com raised Textron from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 25th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating, five have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Textron currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $93.63.

Textron Price Performance

Shares of TXT stock traded up $1.66 during trading hours on Tuesday, reaching $95.43. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 351,548 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,139,008. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $91.77 and its 200-day simple moving average is $83.61. The company has a market capitalization of $18.36 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.52, a PEG ratio of 1.47 and a beta of 1.30. Textron Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $61.27 and a fifty-two week high of $97.33. The company has a quick ratio of 1.03, a current ratio of 1.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.50.

Textron (NYSE:TXT) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 24th. The aerospace company reported $1.60 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.53 by $0.07. Textron had a return on equity of 16.05% and a net margin of 6.73%. The company had revenue of $3.89 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.97 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $1.07 EPS. Textron’s revenue was up 7.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that Textron Inc. will post 6.27 earnings per share for the current year.

Textron Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, April 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 15th were paid a $0.02 dividend. This represents a $0.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.08%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 14th. Textron’s payout ratio is 1.75%.

About Textron

Textron Inc operates in the aircraft, defense, industrial, and finance businesses worldwide. It operates through six segments: Textron Aviation, Bell, Textron Systems, Industrial, Textron eAviation, and Finance. The Textron Aviation segment manufactures, sells, and services business jets, turboprop and piston engine aircraft, and military trainer and defense aircraft; and offers maintenance, inspection, and repair services, as well as sells commercial parts.