Sit Investment Associates Inc. Increases Stake in Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU)

Sit Investment Associates Inc. raised its stake in shares of Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) by 35.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The fund owned 77,065 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock after purchasing an additional 20,155 shares during the period. Sit Investment Associates Inc.’s holdings in Micron Technology were worth $6,486,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of MU. Benjamin Edwards Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Micron Technology during the 3rd quarter worth about $600,000. Quarry LP increased its position in shares of Micron Technology by 113.7% in the third quarter. Quarry LP now owns 1,291 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock worth $134,000 after acquiring an additional 687 shares in the last quarter. Weiss Asset Management LP purchased a new position in shares of Micron Technology in the 3rd quarter valued at $2,932,000. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Micron Technology by 61.9% during the 3rd quarter. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC now owns 129,715 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock valued at $13,453,000 after acquiring an additional 49,592 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Insigneo Advisory Services LLC boosted its position in Micron Technology by 12.5% during the 3rd quarter. Insigneo Advisory Services LLC now owns 11,774 shares of the semiconductor manufacturer’s stock worth $1,221,000 after purchasing an additional 1,311 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.84% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have commented on the company. Citigroup reduced their price objective on Micron Technology from $150.00 to $120.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 21st. KGI Securities raised Micron Technology to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 21st. UBS Group increased their price objective on shares of Micron Technology from $125.00 to $130.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, March 17th. The Goldman Sachs Group decreased their target price on shares of Micron Technology from $145.00 to $128.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Robert W. Baird lifted their price target on shares of Micron Technology from $130.00 to $163.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, March 21st. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, twenty have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $129.76.

Micron Technology Stock Performance

Shares of MU stock opened at $64.72 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $72.33 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.65 and a beta of 1.23. The business has a 50 day moving average of $93.42 and a two-hundred day moving average of $98.16. Micron Technology, Inc. has a 52 week low of $63.86 and a 52 week high of $157.54. The company has a quick ratio of 1.75, a current ratio of 2.72 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28.

Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 20th. The semiconductor manufacturer reported $1.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.43 by $0.13. Micron Technology had a return on equity of 8.32% and a net margin of 13.34%. The business had revenue of $8.05 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $7.93 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.42 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 38.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts anticipate that Micron Technology, Inc. will post 6.08 EPS for the current year.

Micron Technology Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 31st will be paid a dividend of $0.115 per share. This represents a $0.46 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.71%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 31st. Micron Technology’s payout ratio is 11.03%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP April S. Arnzen sold 15,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, March 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $96.18, for a total transaction of $1,442,700.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 164,769 shares in the company, valued at approximately $15,847,482.42. The trade was a 8.34 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, Director Mary Pat Mccarthy sold 2,404 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $92.93, for a total value of $223,403.72. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 27,358 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,542,378.94. This represents a 8.08 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.30% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Micron Technology

Micron Technology, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and sells memory and storage products worldwide. The company operates through four segments: Compute and Networking Business Unit, Mobile Business Unit, Embedded Business Unit, and Storage Business Unit. It provides memory and storage technologies comprising dynamic random access memory semiconductor devices with low latency that provide high-speed data retrieval; non-volatile and re-writeable semiconductor storage devices; and non-volatile re-writable semiconductor memory devices that provide fast read speeds under the Micron and Crucial brands, as well as through private labels.