Benjamin Edwards Inc. Purchases New Shares in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS)

Benjamin Edwards Inc. acquired a new position in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor acquired 5,983 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $272,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its position in Fortis by 4.5% in the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 489,343 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $19,006,000 after acquiring an additional 21,059 shares in the last quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc increased its holdings in Fortis by 4.2% in the 2nd quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 3,938,001 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $152,955,000 after buying an additional 158,178 shares in the last quarter. Fiera Capital Corp raised its position in Fortis by 10.8% in the 2nd quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 858,512 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $33,380,000 after buying an additional 83,858 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in Fortis by 5.8% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,352,485 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $61,516,000 after acquiring an additional 73,682 shares during the period. Finally, Intact Investment Management Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Fortis by 163.8% during the 3rd quarter. Intact Investment Management Inc. now owns 227,700 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $10,347,000 after acquiring an additional 141,400 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 57.77% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the stock. Raymond James downgraded shares of Fortis from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, November 6th. UBS Group upgraded Fortis to a “strong sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 10th. Finally, Bank of America started coverage on Fortis in a report on Friday, September 20th. They issued an “underperform” rating for the company. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and two have given a hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Fortis currently has a consensus rating of “Reduce”.

Fortis Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE FTS opened at $43.61 on Wednesday. Fortis Inc. has a 12-month low of $36.86 and a 12-month high of $46.06. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.32, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.06 and a beta of 0.49. The company has a current ratio of 0.74, a quick ratio of 0.63 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $44.27 and a 200 day moving average of $42.64.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 5th. The utilities provider reported $0.85 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.59 by $0.26. Fortis had a net margin of 14.06% and a return on equity of 7.01%. The firm had revenue of $2.03 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.01 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.63 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Fortis Inc. will post 2.32 earnings per share for the current year.

Fortis Cuts Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Saturday, March 1st. Investors of record on Tuesday, February 18th will be paid a dividend of $0.4382 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 18th. This represents a $1.75 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.02%. Fortis’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 76.47%.

Fortis Profile

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.