First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. Acquires New Stake in The AES Co. (NYSE:AES)

First Trust Direct Indexing L.P. acquired a new stake in shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund acquired 12,484 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $240,000.

A number of other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the business. FMR LLC raised its position in AES by 38.6% during the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 36,821,650 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $559,689,000 after purchasing an additional 10,256,781 shares in the last quarter. Electron Capital Partners LLC raised its position in AES by 9.3% during the 3rd quarter. Electron Capital Partners LLC now owns 8,060,064 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $122,513,000 after purchasing an additional 686,719 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. raised its position in AES by 24.2% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 7,611,339 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $115,692,000 after purchasing an additional 1,484,052 shares in the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp raised its position in AES by 0.5% during the 3rd quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 6,108,260 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $92,846,000 after purchasing an additional 29,488 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its position in AES by 2.5% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 5,728,296 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $87,070,000 after purchasing an additional 140,149 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 93.13% of the company’s stock.

AES Stock Performance

Shares of AES stock opened at $18.82 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $13.37 billion, a PE ratio of 26.14 and a beta of 1.08. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $16.87 and a 200-day simple moving average of $17.09. The company has a quick ratio of 0.71, a current ratio of 0.78 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.04. The AES Co. has a 52-week low of $11.43 and a 52-week high of $23.07.

AES (NYSE:AES) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, May 3rd. The utilities provider reported $0.50 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.34 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $3.09 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.20 billion. AES had a return on equity of 36.23% and a net margin of 4.40%. AES’s quarterly revenue was down 4.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.22 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that The AES Co. will post 1.91 EPS for the current year.

AES Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, May 1st will be paid a dividend of $0.1725 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, April 30th. This represents a $0.69 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.67%. AES’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 95.83%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have issued reports on AES. Morgan Stanley reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $25.00 target price on shares of AES in a research note on Monday, March 25th. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and set a $22.00 target price on shares of AES in a research note on Tuesday, April 9th. Argus restated a “buy” rating and set a $25.00 target price on shares of AES in a research note on Tuesday, March 26th. Mizuho started coverage on AES in a research note on Thursday, April 18th. They set a “buy” rating and a $21.00 target price on the stock. Finally, UBS Group dropped their target price on AES from $20.00 to $19.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, April 3rd. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, AES presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $22.13.

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.