CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP) Receives Average Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

Shares of CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP) have received an average recommendation of “Hold” from the fourteen research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating on the company. The average 1 year price target among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $37.3750.

CNP has been the subject of several research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their target price on CenterPoint Energy from $39.00 to $40.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 15th. Wall Street Zen cut CenterPoint Energy from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Friday, July 18th. Mizuho set a $39.00 price target on CenterPoint Energy and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $36.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 22nd. Finally, Scotiabank raised their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $40.00 to $42.00 and gave the stock a “sector outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in CNP. Capital Research Global Investors lifted its holdings in CenterPoint Energy by 156.4% during the fourth quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 45,573,115 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $1,446,036,000 after acquiring an additional 27,799,744 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 2nd quarter valued at about $313,456,000. BROOKFIELD Corp ON acquired a new stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 4th quarter valued at about $164,350,000. Nuveen LLC acquired a new stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 1st quarter valued at about $92,025,000. Finally, GQG Partners LLC acquired a new stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 1st quarter valued at about $78,632,000. 91.77% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

CenterPoint Energy Stock Down 0.5%

NYSE CNP opened at $38.45 on Friday. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $37.00 and a 200-day moving average of $36.19. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.10 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 0.58. CenterPoint Energy has a 52 week low of $25.41 and a 52 week high of $39.39. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.87, a quick ratio of 0.61 and a current ratio of 0.79.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 24th. The utilities provider reported $0.29 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.44 by ($0.15). The firm had revenue of $1.94 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.20 billion. CenterPoint Energy had a net margin of 10.42% and a return on equity of 9.16%. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.36 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that CenterPoint Energy will post 1.75 EPS for the current year.

CenterPoint Energy Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 11th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, August 21st will be issued a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, August 21st. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.3%. CenterPoint Energy’s payout ratio is currently 61.54%.

CenterPoint Energy Company Profile

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.