Premier Path Wealth Partners LLC Raises Position in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Premier Path Wealth Partners LLC lifted its stake in shares of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 5.4% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 45,299 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after buying an additional 2,306 shares during the quarter. Premier Path Wealth Partners LLC’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $1,812,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the stock. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its position in Verizon Communications by 6.2% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 101,273,082 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $4,548,163,000 after buying an additional 5,936,009 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 2.2% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 95,824,245 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $4,289,054,000 after acquiring an additional 2,081,241 shares in the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc boosted its holdings in Verizon Communications by 3.0% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 38,357,031 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $1,581,848,000 after purchasing an additional 1,106,887 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in Verizon Communications by 2.0% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 29,074,297 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $1,305,727,000 after purchasing an additional 565,842 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Parnassus Investments LLC increased its holdings in Verizon Communications by 2.8% during the 3rd quarter. Parnassus Investments LLC now owns 18,161,563 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $815,636,000 after purchasing an additional 502,949 shares during the last quarter. 62.06% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

VZ has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Scotiabank raised their price target on shares of Verizon Communications from $46.50 to $47.25 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, October 18th. Sanford C. Bernstein started coverage on shares of Verizon Communications in a research report on Tuesday, December 10th. They issued a “market perform” rating and a $48.00 target price for the company. KeyCorp lowered shares of Verizon Communications from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 24th. UBS Group lifted their price target on Verizon Communications from $44.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Finally, Raymond James increased their target price on Verizon Communications from $44.00 to $48.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, September 24th. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $46.54.

Verizon Communications Stock Up 1.4 %

VZ stock opened at $38.86 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $163.58 billion, a PE ratio of 16.75, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.17 and a beta of 0.46. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $41.06 and its 200 day simple moving average is $41.71. Verizon Communications Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $37.58 and a fifty-two week high of $45.36. The company has a quick ratio of 0.62, a current ratio of 0.66 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 22nd. The cell phone carrier reported $1.19 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.18 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $33.30 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $33.42 billion. Verizon Communications had a net margin of 7.30% and a return on equity of 20.05%. Verizon Communications’s revenue was up .9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $1.22 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.6 EPS for the current year.

Verizon Communications Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, February 3rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 10th will be given a dividend of $0.6775 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 10th. This represents a $2.71 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 6.97%. Verizon Communications’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 116.81%.

About Verizon Communications

Verizon Communications Inc, through its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of communications, technology, information, and entertainment products and services to consumers, businesses, and governmental entities worldwide. It operates in two segments, Verizon Consumer Group (Consumer) and Verizon Business Group (Business).