Bank of America Lowers General Mills (NYSE:GIS) Price Target to $68.00

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) had its price objective dropped by equities research analysts at Bank of America from $70.00 to $68.00 in a research report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a “buy” rating on the stock. Bank of America‘s price objective points to a potential upside of 14.80% from the company’s previous close.

A number of other brokerages have also recently weighed in on GIS. Mizuho dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $72.00 to $65.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 10th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $83.00 to $82.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $68.00 to $65.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $62.00 to $60.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, March 11th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on shares of General Mills from $72.00 to $65.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 19th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, thirteen have assigned a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, General Mills currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $67.41.

General Mills Trading Down 2.0 %

Shares of General Mills stock opened at $59.23 on Thursday. General Mills has a 12-month low of $55.15 and a 12-month high of $75.90. The company has a current ratio of 0.92, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32. The stock has a market cap of $32.65 billion, a PE ratio of 12.88, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.94 and a beta of 0.06. The company has a 50-day moving average of $60.04 and a two-hundred day moving average of $65.42.

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, March 19th. The company reported $1.00 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.96 by $0.04. General Mills had a net margin of 13.08% and a return on equity of 27.55%. The company had revenue of $4.84 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.99 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.17 earnings per share. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 5.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts anticipate that General Mills will post 4.36 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at General Mills

In other General Mills news, CEO Jeffrey L. Harmening sold 11,379 shares of General Mills stock in a transaction on Friday, March 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $65.00, for a total value of $739,635.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 353,346 shares in the company, valued at $22,967,490. This trade represents a 3.12 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, insider Paul Joseph Gallagher sold 1,041 shares of General Mills stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.50, for a total transaction of $67,144.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 42,117 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,716,546.50. This trade represents a 2.41 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.26% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On General Mills

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Gladstone Institutional Advisory LLC lifted its holdings in shares of General Mills by 6.0% during the 4th quarter. Gladstone Institutional Advisory LLC now owns 4,765 shares of the company’s stock valued at $304,000 after acquiring an additional 268 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its holdings in shares of General Mills by 105.2% during the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 5,708,223 shares of the company’s stock valued at $421,552,000 after acquiring an additional 2,926,232 shares in the last quarter. J2 Capital Management Inc acquired a new position in shares of General Mills during the 4th quarter valued at $547,000. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of General Mills by 7.1% during the 4th quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 72,949 shares of the company’s stock valued at $4,652,000 after acquiring an additional 4,839 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Nordea Investment Management AB lifted its holdings in General Mills by 64.5% in the 4th quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 7,803,046 shares of the company’s stock worth $497,054,000 after buying an additional 3,058,414 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.71% of the company’s stock.

About General Mills

General Mills, Inc manufactures and markets branded consumer foods worldwide. The company operates through four segments: North America Retail; International; Pet; and North America Foodservice. It offers grain, ready-to-eat cereals, refrigerated yogurt, soup, meal kits, refrigerated and frozen dough products, dessert and baking mixes, bakery flour, frozen pizza and pizza snacks, snack bars, fruit and savory snacks, ice cream and frozen desserts, unbaked and fully baked frozen dough products, frozen hot snacks, ethnic meals, side dish mixes, frozen breakfast and entrees, nutrition bars, and frozen and shelf-stable vegetables.