Uniti Group Inc. (NASDAQ:UNIT) Shares Bought by BlackRock Inc.

BlackRock Inc. increased its position in Uniti Group Inc. (NASDAQ:UNIT – Get Rating) by 0.7% during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 37,945,737 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock after acquiring an additional 249,439 shares during the period. BlackRock Inc. owned approximately 16.00% of Uniti Group worth $263,723,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of UNIT. Blueshift Asset Management LLC acquired a new stake in Uniti Group in the third quarter valued at $92,000. Caxton Associates LP increased its holdings in Uniti Group by 30.3% during the 3rd quarter. Caxton Associates LP now owns 37,119 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $258,000 after acquiring an additional 8,626 shares in the last quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC raised its position in Uniti Group by 10.7% during the third quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC now owns 18,148 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $126,000 after acquiring an additional 1,758 shares during the last quarter. Tudor Investment Corp Et Al acquired a new stake in shares of Uniti Group in the third quarter valued at approximately $174,000. Finally, Point72 Hong Kong Ltd purchased a new position in shares of Uniti Group during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $127,000. 83.82% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

UNIT has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Barclays lowered their target price on Uniti Group from $9.00 to $8.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, February 27th. Citigroup cut their target price on shares of Uniti Group from $9.00 to $7.25 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 1st. Raymond James lowered their price target on shares of Uniti Group from $12.00 to $8.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, March 1st. The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their price objective on shares of Uniti Group from $7.00 to $6.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, February 27th. Finally, Cowen lowered their target price on shares of Uniti Group from $15.00 to $9.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 27th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating, one has issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Uniti Group currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $7.46.

Insider Activity

In other Uniti Group news, CEO Kenny Gunderman acquired 225,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, March 9th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $4.37 per share, for a total transaction of $983,250.00. Following the completion of the purchase, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,372,596 shares in the company, valued at $5,998,244.52. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 0.72% of the company’s stock.

Uniti Group Stock Down 1.2 %

UNIT stock opened at $4.28 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $1.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -38.91, a PEG ratio of 0.19 and a beta of 1.31. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $5.84 and a 200-day simple moving average of $6.83. Uniti Group Inc. has a 52 week low of $4.20 and a 52 week high of $14.25.

Uniti Group Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, April 14th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 31st will be issued a $0.15 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, March 30th. This represents a $0.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 14.02%. Uniti Group’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is -545.45%.

Uniti Group Company Profile

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Uniti Group, Inc is a real estate investment trust company, which is engaged in the acquisition and construction of mission infrastructure in the communications industry. It operates through the following business segments: Leasing, Fiber Infrastructure, Towers, Consumer CLEC, and Corporate. The Leasing segment represents the real estate investment trust operations of the company and includes the results from leasing business, Uniti leasing, which engages in the acquisition of mission-critical communications assets and leasing them to anchor customers on either and exclusive or shared-tenant basis.