First Horizon Advisors Inc. Acquires 375 Shares of CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP)

First Horizon Advisors Inc. raised its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP) by 51.3% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 1,106 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 375 shares during the period. First Horizon Advisors Inc.’s holdings in CenterPoint Energy were worth $33,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Boston Partners raised its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 3.3% during the first quarter. Boston Partners now owns 17,545,528 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $499,962,000 after purchasing an additional 556,802 shares during the last quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC lifted its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 46.6% during the 2nd quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 4,666,563 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $144,570,000 after buying an additional 1,484,079 shares during the period. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans boosted its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 1.3% in the 2nd quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 4,043,757 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $125,275,000 after buying an additional 53,655 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 8.3% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,611,909 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $80,914,000 after acquiring an additional 200,693 shares during the period. Finally, Thompson Siegel & Walmsley LLC increased its position in CenterPoint Energy by 3.4% during the second quarter. Thompson Siegel & Walmsley LLC now owns 2,072,438 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $64,204,000 after acquiring an additional 68,753 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.77% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have issued reports on CNP. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut CenterPoint Energy from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their target price for the stock from $32.00 to $29.00 in a research report on Friday, August 2nd. Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $32.00 to $31.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday. StockNews.com cut shares of CenterPoint Energy from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on CenterPoint Energy from $28.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 16th. Finally, Bank of America initiated coverage on CenterPoint Energy in a report on Thursday, September 12th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $29.00 price target for the company. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $30.00.

CenterPoint Energy Stock Up 1.8 %

NYSE CNP opened at $32.49 on Tuesday. The company has a current ratio of 1.11, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.87. CenterPoint Energy, Inc. has a 12 month low of $25.41 and a 12 month high of $32.61. The stock’s 50 day moving average is $29.79 and its 200 day moving average is $29.18. The stock has a market cap of $21.17 billion, a PE ratio of 21.52, a P/E/G ratio of 2.77 and a beta of 0.92.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) last posted its earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The utilities provider reported $0.31 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.31. The company had revenue of $1.86 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.88 billion. CenterPoint Energy had a net margin of 11.25% and a return on equity of 9.73%. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.40 earnings per share. Research analysts predict that CenterPoint Energy, Inc. will post 1.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

CenterPoint Energy Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 21st will be given a $0.21 dividend. This is an increase from CenterPoint Energy’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.59%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, November 21st. CenterPoint Energy’s payout ratio is currently 55.63%.

CenterPoint Energy Company Profile

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.