Point72 Europe London LLP Takes $2.99 Million Position in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS)

Point72 Europe London LLP purchased a new position in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 77,000 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $2,991,000.

Other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. FIL Ltd increased its stake in shares of Fortis by 33.8% during the fourth quarter. FIL Ltd now owns 19,477,406 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $801,263,000 after purchasing an additional 4,924,031 shares in the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc boosted its holdings in Fortis by 22.3% in the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 13,380,619 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $553,145,000 after buying an additional 2,438,223 shares during the last quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank increased its stake in Fortis by 26.9% during the 2nd quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 9,071,484 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $352,336,000 after buying an additional 1,920,728 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Fortis by 44.6% during the fourth quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 2,653,873 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $109,154,000 after acquiring an additional 818,835 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Alberta Investment Management Corp lifted its position in shares of Fortis by 95.8% in the fourth quarter. Alberta Investment Management Corp now owns 1,204,145 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $49,779,000 after acquiring an additional 589,117 shares in the last quarter. 57.77% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

FTS has been the subject of several research reports. Bank of America assumed coverage on Fortis in a research report on Friday, September 20th. They set an “underperform” rating for the company. StockNews.com raised shares of Fortis from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Sunday, August 4th. Finally, UBS Group upgraded shares of Fortis to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 10th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and two have assigned a hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Fortis presently has a consensus rating of “Reduce” and an average price target of $61.00.

Fortis Price Performance

NYSE:FTS opened at $45.15 on Wednesday. Fortis Inc. has a one year low of $36.30 and a one year high of $45.83. The stock has a market cap of $22.36 billion, a PE ratio of 19.46, a P/E/G ratio of 3.99 and a beta of 0.47. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.26, a quick ratio of 0.58 and a current ratio of 0.69. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $43.30 and a 200 day moving average price of $40.80.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The utilities provider reported $0.49 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.47 by $0.02. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.04% and a net margin of 13.90%. The business had revenue of $1.95 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.96 billion. Equities research analysts expect that Fortis Inc. will post 2.34 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Cuts Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Sunday, September 1st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, August 20th were paid a $0.431 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, August 20th. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.82%. Fortis’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 73.71%.

About Fortis

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.