St. Jude Medical, Inc. (NYSE:STJ) has been given an “A” credit rating by analysts at Morningstar. The investment research firm’s “A” rating indicates that the company is a low default risk. They also gave their stock a four star rating.

Shares of St. Jude Medical (NYSE:STJ) opened at 53.30 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $15.27 billion and a P/E ratio of 17.36. St. Jude Medical has a 12-month low of $52.17 and a 12-month high of $80.84. The company has a 50-day moving average of $58.09 and a 200-day moving average of $64.95.

St. Jude Medical (NYSE:STJ) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 27th. The medical technology company reported $1.02 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the Zacks’ consensus estimate of $1.01 by $0.01. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $1.03 earnings per share. The business earned $1.45 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.48 billion. St. Jude Medical’s revenue was up .6% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts expect that St. Jude Medical will post $4.01 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 29th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 31st were paid a dividend of $0.29 per share. This represents a $1.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.18%. This is a boost from St. Jude Medical’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.23. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, December 29th.

Several other research analysts also recently issued reports on STJ. BTIG Research reissued a “buy” rating and set a $69.00 price objective on shares of St. Jude Medical in a research report on Thursday, November 12th. Deutsche Bank lowered their price objective on shares of St. Jude Medical from $65.00 to $64.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, January 15th. Oppenheimer lowered their price objective on shares of St. Jude Medical from $72.00 to $64.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 28th. BMO Capital Markets lowered their price objective on shares of St. Jude Medical from $61.00 to $60.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 28th. Finally, Needham & Company LLC reissued a “buy” rating and set a $70.00 price objective on shares of St. Jude Medical in a research report on Thursday, January 28th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and twelve have given a buy rating to the company. St. Jude Medical presently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $73.57.

In other news, EVP John C. Heinmiller sold 8,009 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, December 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $61.16, for a total value of $489,830.44. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 237,211 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $14,507,824.76. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Donald Zurbay sold 3,106 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $60.96, for a total transaction of $189,341.76. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 19,284 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,175,552.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here.

Several hedge funds recently bought and sold shares of the company. Eagle Asset Management increased its position in St. Jude Medical by 90.8% in the third quarter. Eagle Asset Management now owns 3,170,436 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $200,022,000 after buying an additional 1,508,658 shares in the last quarter. KBC Group increased its position in St. Jude Medical by 198.9% in the third quarter. KBC Group now owns 66,535 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $4,198,000 after buying an additional 44,274 shares in the last quarter. ING Groep increased its position in St. Jude Medical by 313.1% in the third quarter. ING Groep now owns 48,406 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $3,052,000 after buying an additional 36,688 shares in the last quarter. Jennison Associates purchased a new position in St. Jude Medical during the third quarter worth approximately $617,000. Finally, Ken Stern & Associates increased its position in St. Jude Medical by 21.5% in the third quarter. Ken Stern & Associates now owns 5,323 shares of the medical technology company’s stock worth $336,000 after buying an additional 943 shares in the last quarter.

St. Jude Medical, Inc. develops, manufactures and distributes cardiovascular medical devices for the global cardiac rhythm management, cardiovascular and atrial fibrillation therapy areas, and interventional pain therapy and neurostimulation devices for the management of chronic pain and movement disorders. Its six principal product categories include tachycardia implantable cardioverter defibrillator (NYSE:STJ) systems, bradycardia pacemaker systems, atrial fibrillation (AF) products (electrophysiology introducers and catheters, advanced cardiac mapping, navigation and recording systems and ablation systems), vascular products (vascular closure products, pressure measurement guidewires, optical coherence tomography (OCT) imaging products, heart failure monitoring device and other vascular accessories), structural heart products and neuromodulation products (spinal cord stimulation and radiofrequency ablation to treat chronic pain and deep brain stimulation to treat movement disorders).

12 Month Chart for NYSE:STJ

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