Capital Research & Management Co recently announced the acquisition of new stake in Johnson & Johnson (NYSE:JNJ). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Healthcare company by 4.17% to 28.99 million shares with purchase of 1.16 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 1.20% valued currently at $4.48 billion. In addition, Norges Bank Investment Management raised its holdings by 1.51 million to 26.09 million shares. And Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC has lifted its position by 1.02% or 0.23 million shares – to 22.58 million shares.
With over 4.16 million Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) shares trading Tuesday and a closing price of $156.14 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $649.5 million. The shares have shown a negative half year performance of -4.38% and its price on 12/26/23 gained nearly 0.44%. Currently, there are 2.61B common shares owned by the public and among those 2.40B 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: 23 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for JNJ have a consensus price objective of $175.58. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $215.00 and a low of $157.00. The average price target is 11.07% above its recent price level and an upside to the estimated low will see the stock gain 0.55% over that period. But an upside of 27.38% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $173.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 63 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 27 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 889,978 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 36 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 604,324 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in Johnson & Johnson are Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF, Vanguard 500 Index Fund, and Fidelity 500 Index Fund. Vanguard Total Stock Market ETF owns 75.47 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $11.67 billion. The company bought an additional 0.1 million shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 3.14% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard 500 Index Fund bought 0.28 million shares to see its total holdings expand to 58.15 million shares valued at over $8.99 billion and representing 2.42% of the shares outstanding. Fidelity 500 Index Fund bought 0.22 million shares to bring its total holdings to over 27.88 million shares at a value of $4.31 billion. Fidelity 500 Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 1.16% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) opened at $155.00, down -$0.46 from a prior closing price of $155.46. However, the script later moved the day high at 156.35, up 0.44%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of 0.45% and -1.81% over the past three months. JNJ shares are trading -11.61% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -11.80% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $144.95 and touched a high of $180.93 over the same period. JNJ has an average intraday trading volume of 7.03 million shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by 0.56%, 2.40%, and -2.06% respectively.
Institutional ownership of Johnson & Johnson (NYSE: JNJ) shares accounts for 70.76% of the company’s 2.61B shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 34.96%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 36.10% and 0.25% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $375.87B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.53. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 29.80, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $5.24. The company has a PEG of 5.73 and a Quick Ratio of 0.96 with the debt-to-equity ratio at 0.42. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 1.29% over the week and 1.33% over the month.
Analysts forecast that Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) will achieve an EPS of $2.28 for the current quarter, $2.63 for the next quarter and $10.7 for 2024. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $2.25 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $2.3. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $2.05 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -1.67%, and 7.48% over the next financial year. EPS should shrink at an annualized rate of 5.20% over the next five years, compared to 70.31% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 23 brokerage firm advisors rate Johnson & Johnson (JNJ) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.17. Specifically, 8 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 12 of the 23 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the JNJ, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. Wells Fargo stated their Equal Weight rating for the stock in a research note on December 13, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $170-$163.
