The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Financial company by 0.40% to 13.9 million shares with purchase of 54905.0 shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 10.30% valued currently at $460.09 million. In addition, EARNEST Partners LLC raised its holdings by 0.16 million to 3.38 million shares. And Geode Capital Management LLC has lifted its position by 4.13% or 0.11 million shares – to 2.89 million shares.
With over 0.45 million United Bankshares, Inc. (UBSI) shares trading Friday and a closing price of $37.88 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $17.14 million. The shares have shown a positive half year performance of 27.54% and its price on 12/22/23 gained nearly 0.56%. Currently, there are 134.75M common shares owned by the public and among those 131.95M shares have been available to trade.
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An analysis of what Wall Street brokers have to say about the expected price targets for this stock gives us this picture: 6 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for UBSI have a consensus price objective of $33.33. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $38.00 and a low of $28.00. The average price target is -13.65% below its recent price level and a downside to the estimated low will see the stock lose -35.29% over that period. But an upside of 0.32% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $34.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 75 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 33 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 122,127 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 42 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 50,615 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in United Bankshares, Inc. are Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, iShares Core S&P Mid Cap ETF, and Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF owns 4.24 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $140.26 million. The company bought an additional 7588.0 shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 3.14% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund bought 10716.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 3.49 million shares at a value of $115.62 million. Vanguard Small Cap Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 2.59% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ: UBSI) opened at $38.05, up $0.38 from a prior closing price of $37.67. However, the script later moved the day high at 38.30, up 0.56%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 0.96% and 39.11% over the past three months. UBSI shares are trading -6.45% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -5.16% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $25.35 and touched a high of $42.45 over the same period. UBSI has an average intraday trading volume of 730.73K shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 6.86%, 19.03%, and 20.74% respectively.
Institutional ownership of United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ: UBSI) shares accounts for 69.10% of the company’s 134.75M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 4.24%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 43.30% and 26.07% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $5.11B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 1.07. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 13.24, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $2.86. The company has a PEG of 1.66 and the debt-to-equity ratio at 0.36. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 2.88% over the week and 2.87% over the month.
Analysts forecast that United Bankshares, Inc. (UBSI) will achieve an EPS of $0.66 for the current quarter, $0.64 for the next quarter and $2.59 for 2024. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.61 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.69. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $0.74 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -1.19%, and -6.51% over the next financial year. EPS should shrink at an annualized rate of 8.00% over the next five years, compared to 12.78% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 6 brokerage firm advisors rate United Bankshares, Inc. (UBSI) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.83. Specifically, 0 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 5 of the 6 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the UBSI, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. Stephens stated their Equal-Weight rating for the stock in a research note on April 04, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $32.
