Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) Raised to Overweight at Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) from an equal weight rating to an overweight rating in a research report sent to investors on Thursday morning, Marketbeat Ratings reports. Morgan Stanley currently has $28.00 price target on the technology company’s stock, up from their previous price target of $23.00.

A number of other research firms also recently commented on HPE. Raymond James raised Hewlett Packard Enterprise from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $23.00 to $29.00 in a research note on Monday, November 18th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft began coverage on shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. They issued a “hold” rating and a $22.00 price target for the company. Susquehanna reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $20.00 price target on shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Barclays upgraded Hewlett Packard Enterprise from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $20.00 to $24.00 in a research note on Wednesday, September 25th. Finally, Citigroup increased their price target on shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $20.00 to $23.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 19th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $23.36.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Trading Up 10.6 %

NYSE:HPE opened at $23.95 on Thursday. The firm has a market capitalization of $31.10 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.61, a P/E/G ratio of 3.40 and a beta of 1.21. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $20.90 and a 200 day simple moving average of $19.90. Hewlett Packard Enterprise has a 12-month low of $14.47 and a 12-month high of $24.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.94 and a quick ratio of 0.62.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, September 4th. The technology company reported $0.50 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.47 by $0.03. Hewlett Packard Enterprise had a return on equity of 8.94% and a net margin of 6.39%. The company had revenue of $7.71 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $7.67 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.35 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 10.1% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts predict that Hewlett Packard Enterprise will post 1.83 EPS for the current year.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 16th. Shareholders of record on Friday, December 20th will be issued a $0.13 dividend. This represents a $0.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.17%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, December 20th. Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 27.37%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Hewlett Packard Enterprise news, EVP Neil B. Macdonald sold 29,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $17.00, for a total transaction of $493,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now owns 82,061 shares in the company, valued at $1,395,037. This trade represents a 26.11 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CEO Antonio F. Neri sold 83,334 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, September 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $19.72, for a total value of $1,643,346.48. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,758,641 shares in the company, valued at approximately $34,680,400.52. This represents a 4.52 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 426,012 shares of company stock valued at $8,599,617 in the last three months. Company insiders own 0.40% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Cetera Investment Advisers increased its holdings in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 455.7% in the first quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 121,204 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,149,000 after purchasing an additional 99,394 shares in the last quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 39.8% in the 1st quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC now owns 55,388 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $982,000 after purchasing an additional 15,774 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its stake in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 16.9% during the second quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 5,421 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $115,000 after purchasing an additional 783 shares during the period. Mather Group LLC. increased its holdings in Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 24.6% in the second quarter. Mather Group LLC. now owns 8,374 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $177,000 after purchasing an additional 1,653 shares during the last quarter. Finally, CWM LLC lifted its stake in Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 41.9% in the second quarter. CWM LLC now owns 61,979 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,312,000 after buying an additional 18,308 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 80.78% of the company’s stock.

About Hewlett Packard Enterprise

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company provides solutions that allow customers to capture, analyze, and act upon data seamlessly in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and Japan. It operates in six segments: Compute, HPC & AI, Storage, Intelligent Edge, Financial Services, and Corporate Investments and Other.