Platinum Investment Management Ltd. Takes $87,000 Position in Dollar General Co. (NYSE:DG)

Platinum Investment Management Ltd. purchased a new stake in shares of Dollar General Co. (NYSE:DG) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund purchased 1,150 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $87,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in DG. Pzena Investment Management LLC grew its position in Dollar General by 453.4% in the third quarter. Pzena Investment Management LLC now owns 10,238,886 shares of the company’s stock worth $865,903,000 after acquiring an additional 8,388,735 shares in the last quarter. First Eagle Investment Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Dollar General during the fourth quarter valued at about $399,433,000. ACR Alpine Capital Research LLC raised its stake in shares of Dollar General by 8,426.1% during the fourth quarter. ACR Alpine Capital Research LLC now owns 4,041,471 shares of the company’s stock valued at $306,424,000 after acquiring an additional 3,994,070 shares during the last quarter. Baupost Group LLC MA bought a new position in Dollar General in the third quarter worth about $194,832,000. Finally, State Street Corp raised its stake in Dollar General by 8.3% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 9,958,704 shares of the company’s stock worth $842,208,000 after buying an additional 759,869 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.77% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

DG has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. The Goldman Sachs Group cut their price objective on shares of Dollar General from $104.00 to $93.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 23rd. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of Dollar General from $90.00 to $80.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, December 5th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft restated a “hold” rating and issued a $80.00 target price (down previously from $90.00) on shares of Dollar General in a report on Monday, March 3rd. Gordon Haskett downgraded shares of Dollar General from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on shares of Dollar General from $80.00 to $84.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 6th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fifteen have given a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $92.26.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Dollar General news, Director Michael M. Calbert sold 6,000 shares of Dollar General stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 31st. The shares were sold at an average price of $75.27, for a total value of $451,620.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 120,322 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,056,636.94. The trade was a 4.75 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Company insiders own 0.49% of the company’s stock.

Dollar General Price Performance

Shares of NYSE DG opened at $81.44 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $17.91 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.42, a PEG ratio of 2.18 and a beta of 0.44. The company has a current ratio of 1.15, a quick ratio of 0.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.78. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $73.92 and its 200 day moving average price is $77.70. Dollar General Co. has a 52 week low of $66.43 and a 52 week high of $164.12.

Dollar General (NYSE:DG) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 13th. The company reported $1.68 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.51 by $0.17. The company had revenue of $10.30 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $10.26 billion. Dollar General had a net margin of 3.33% and a return on equity of 18.85%. Dollar General’s revenue for the quarter was up 4.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.83 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts forecast that Dollar General Co. will post 5.75 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Dollar General Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 22nd. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, April 8th will be issued a dividend of $0.59 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, April 8th. This represents a $2.36 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.90%. Dollar General’s dividend payout ratio is 46.18%.

About Dollar General

Dollar General Corporation, a discount retailer, provides various merchandise products in the southern, southwestern, midwestern, and eastern United States. It offers consumable products, including paper and cleaning products, such as paper towels, bath tissues, paper dinnerware, trash and storage bags, disinfectants, and laundry products; packaged food comprising cereals, pasta, canned soups, fruits and vegetables, condiments, spices, sugar, and flour; and perishables that include milk, eggs, bread, refrigerated and frozen food, beer, and wine.