Brandywine Global Investment Management LLC Reduces Position in WaFd, Inc (NASDAQ:WAFD)

Brandywine Global Investment Management LLC reduced its stake in WaFd, Inc (NASDAQ:WAFD) by 59.0% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 138,147 shares of the bank’s stock after selling 198,655 shares during the quarter. Brandywine Global Investment Management LLC owned about 0.17% of WaFd worth $4,454,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA lifted its holdings in WaFd by 24.2% in the 4th quarter. Pictet Asset Management Holding SA now owns 11,249 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $363,000 after purchasing an additional 2,195 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of WaFd during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $6,539,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its position in WaFd by 152.9% during the fourth quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 469,704 shares of the bank’s stock worth $15,143,000 after acquiring an additional 283,953 shares during the last quarter. EntryPoint Capital LLC purchased a new stake in WaFd in the 4th quarter worth approximately $403,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in WaFd by 1.8% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 9,420,004 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $303,701,000 after acquiring an additional 166,931 shares during the last quarter. 83.71% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have recently commented on WAFD. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price objective on WaFd from $42.00 to $34.00 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. Stephens restated an “equal weight” rating and issued a $38.00 price target on shares of WaFd in a report on Friday, January 17th. DA Davidson downgraded shares of WaFd from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price objective for the company from $35.00 to $32.00 in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. StockNews.com raised shares of WaFd from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 6th. Finally, Piper Sandler lowered their target price on shares of WaFd from $37.00 to $31.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, January 21st. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $33.75.

WaFd Stock Down 1.3 %

NASDAQ:WAFD opened at $28.22 on Wednesday. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $29.22 and a 200 day simple moving average of $32.67. WaFd, Inc has a one year low of $25.79 and a one year high of $38.62. The company has a market capitalization of $2.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.00 and a beta of 0.83. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.05, a quick ratio of 1.04 and a current ratio of 1.04.

WaFd Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 7th. Investors of record on Friday, February 21st were given a dividend of $0.27 per share. This is a positive change from WaFd’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.26. This represents a $1.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.83%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, February 21st. WaFd’s dividend payout ratio is currently 49.77%.

WaFd Company Profile

WaFd, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Washington Federal Bank that provides lending, depository, insurance, and other banking services in the United States. The company offers deposit products, including business and personal checking accounts, and term certificates of deposit, as well as money market accounts and passbook savings accounts.