CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC Invests $249,000 in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS)

CIBC Private Wealth Group LLC acquired a new stake in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm acquired 5,942 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $249,000.

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Fortis by 1.7% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 21,722,993 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $902,656,000 after acquiring an additional 364,391 shares during the period. TD Asset Management Inc. boosted its stake in Fortis by 1.4% in the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc. now owns 12,266,121 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $509,425,000 after purchasing an additional 173,226 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Fortis during the 4th quarter valued at about $182,242,000. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its position in shares of Fortis by 9.5% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 2,890,184 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $131,330,000 after buying an additional 250,630 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Fortis by 10.3% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,404,404 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $111,771,000 after buying an additional 223,733 shares in the last quarter. 57.77% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Separately, Jefferies Financial Group assumed coverage on shares of Fortis in a research note on Thursday, February 13th. They set a “hold” rating for the company. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and three have given a hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Fortis has a consensus rating of “Hold”.

Fortis Trading Down 2.3 %

Shares of FTS stock opened at $46.24 on Monday. The company has a market capitalization of $23.09 billion, a PE ratio of 19.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.94 and a beta of 0.46. Fortis Inc. has a 52-week low of $36.86 and a 52-week high of $48.07. The business’s fifty day moving average is $44.32 and its 200 day moving average is $43.75. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.30, a quick ratio of 0.63 and a current ratio of 0.63.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 14th. The utilities provider reported $0.59 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.57 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $2.11 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.08 billion. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.09% and a net margin of 14.12%. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.72 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Fortis Inc. will post 2.35 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Cuts Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Sunday, June 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 16th will be given a dividend of $0.4324 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 16th. This represents a $1.73 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.74%. Fortis’s payout ratio is presently 72.03%.

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.