Desjardins Forecasts Strong Price Appreciation for BCE (TSE:BCE) Stock

BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) had its price target upped by equities research analysts at Desjardins from C$36.00 to C$39.00 in a research report issued on Friday,BayStreet.CA reports. The brokerage presently has a “hold” rating on the stock. Desjardins’ price target would indicate a potential upside of 23.42% from the stock’s current price.

Other equities analysts have also issued research reports about the stock. National Bank Financial raised shares of BCE from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 3rd. Royal Bank of Canada cut their price target on BCE from C$39.00 to C$37.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 9th. Barclays lowered BCE from an “equal weight” rating to an “underperform” rating and reduced their price target for the stock from C$41.00 to C$30.00 in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Scotiabank lowered their price objective on BCE from C$40.00 to C$39.50 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, April 16th. Finally, Canaccord Genuity Group reduced their target price on BCE from C$33.50 to C$31.50 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, April 7th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have issued a hold rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, BCE has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of C$37.55.

BCE Trading Up 2.1 %

BCE stock opened at C$31.60 on Friday. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of C$31.72 and a 200 day moving average price of C$34.45. BCE has a 52 week low of C$28.73 and a 52 week high of C$49.13. The stock has a market cap of C$28.62 billion, a PE ratio of 106.01, a P/E/G ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.48. The company has a current ratio of 0.62, a quick ratio of 0.43 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 226.73.

About BCE

BCE is both a wireless and internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada. It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its roughly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrierthe legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provincesOntario and Quebec.