US Bancorp DE Lowers Stake in Hercules Capital, Inc. $HTGC

US Bancorp DE lowered its position in shares of Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) by 1.7% during the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 41,970 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 712 shares during the quarter. US Bancorp DE’s holdings in Hercules Capital were worth $767,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of HTGC. Farther Finance Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 79.5% in the first quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 4,292 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $82,000 after buying an additional 1,901 shares in the last quarter. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 2.0% in the first quarter. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC now owns 32,832 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $631,000 after buying an additional 628 shares in the last quarter. ORG Partners LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 37.1% in the first quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 11,756 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $225,000 after buying an additional 3,181 shares in the last quarter. Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 27.4% in the first quarter. Oppenheimer & Co. Inc. now owns 20,218 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $388,000 after buying an additional 4,352 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Bessemer Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Hercules Capital in the first quarter worth $38,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 19.69% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the stock. Citigroup reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Hercules Capital in a report on Monday, August 4th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Hercules Capital in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Piper Sandler lowered their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $21.00 to $20.50 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, October 9th. JMP Securities increased their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $22.00 to $24.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, August 4th. Finally, UBS Group lowered their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $19.00 to $18.50 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday. Six analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $20.42.

Hercules Capital Trading Up 0.8%

Shares of HTGC opened at $17.31 on Friday. Hercules Capital, Inc. has a twelve month low of $15.65 and a twelve month high of $22.04. The company has a market cap of $3.14 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.46 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a current ratio of 1.68, a quick ratio of 1.68 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.96. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $18.84 and its 200-day simple moving average is $18.34.

Hercules Capital (NYSE:HTGC) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, July 31st. The financial services provider reported $0.50 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.47 by $0.03. Hercules Capital had a net margin of 51.46% and a return on equity of 16.54%. The business had revenue of $137.46 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $129.47 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $0.51 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that Hercules Capital, Inc. will post 1.96 EPS for the current year.

Hercules Capital Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, August 19th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th were paid a $0.47 dividend. This is an increase from Hercules Capital’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.40. This represents a $1.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 10.9%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, August 12th. Hercules Capital’s payout ratio is currently 105.96%.

Hercules Capital Profile

Hercules Capital, Inc is a business development company. The firm specializing in providing venture debt, debt, senior secured loans, and growth capital to privately held venture capital-backed companies at all stages of development from startups to expansion stage including select publicly listed companies and select special opportunity lower middle market companies that require additional capital to fund acquisitions, recapitalizations and refinancing and established-stage companies.