Andra AP fonden Acquires Shares of 214,700 The AES Co. (NYSE:AES)

Andra AP fonden acquired a new stake in The AES Co. (NYSE:AES) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm acquired 214,700 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $2,763,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in AES. State Street Corp increased its position in AES by 18.2% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 38,651,752 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $775,354,000 after acquiring an additional 5,960,546 shares in the last quarter. Raymond James Financial Inc. acquired a new stake in AES in the 4th quarter valued at about $33,964,000. Two Sigma Advisers LP increased its position in AES by 30.3% in the 3rd quarter. Two Sigma Advisers LP now owns 3,838,500 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $77,000,000 after acquiring an additional 892,500 shares in the last quarter. Bridgewater Associates LP acquired a new stake in AES in the 3rd quarter valued at about $17,390,000. Finally, HighTower Advisors LLC increased its position in AES by 53.0% in the 3rd quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC now owns 1,596,850 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $32,031,000 after acquiring an additional 553,311 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 93.13% of the company’s stock.

AES Stock Up 3.3 %

AES stock opened at $11.23 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.21, a current ratio of 0.85 and a quick ratio of 0.80. The AES Co. has a fifty-two week low of $9.88 and a fifty-two week high of $22.21. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $11.32 and its 200 day simple moving average is $14.29. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.98 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 7.80, a PEG ratio of 0.82 and a beta of 0.94.

AES (NYSE:AES) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 28th. The utilities provider reported $0.54 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.34 by $0.20. AES had a net margin of 8.34% and a return on equity of 27.30%. The firm had revenue of $2.96 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.07 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.73 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that The AES Co. will post 1.93 EPS for the current year.

AES Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, May 1st will be paid a $0.176 dividend. This represents a $0.70 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 6.27%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 1st. AES’s payout ratio is currently 29.54%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have recently commented on AES shares. Barclays lowered their price target on shares of AES from $17.00 to $12.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 27th. Bank of America upgraded shares of AES from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $11.00 to $13.00 in a research report on Tuesday, March 4th. Mizuho lowered their price target on shares of AES from $16.00 to $15.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, March 4th. Hsbc Global Res upgraded shares of AES to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 13th. Finally, Seaport Res Ptn cut shares of AES from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Monday, March 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating, eight have issued a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $18.30.

AES Company Profile

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market.