FirstEnergy (NYSE:FE) Price Target Raised to $50.00

FirstEnergy (NYSE:FE) had its price objective upped by Mizuho from $45.00 to $50.00 in a report issued on Friday, MarketBeat.com reports. They currently have a neutral rating on the utilities provider’s stock.

Other research analysts also recently issued research reports about the company. KeyCorp downgraded FirstEnergy from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 14th. Citigroup assumed coverage on FirstEnergy in a research note on Tuesday, October 7th. They set a “buy” rating and a $53.00 target price for the company. Barclays raised FirstEnergy from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $43.00 to $49.00 in a research note on Monday, August 25th. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on FirstEnergy from $47.00 to $50.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 21st. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of FirstEnergy in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $48.25.

FirstEnergy Stock Up 0.6%

FE stock opened at $46.80 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $27.02 billion, a PE ratio of 20.44, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.85 and a beta of 0.52. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $44.80 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.66. FirstEnergy has a 52 week low of $37.58 and a 52 week high of $48.20. The company has a quick ratio of 0.51, a current ratio of 0.61 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.68.

FirstEnergy (NYSE:FE) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 22nd. The utilities provider reported $0.83 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.76 by $0.07. The business had revenue of $4.10 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.94 billion. FirstEnergy had a return on equity of 11.20% and a net margin of 9.19%.FirstEnergy’s revenue for the quarter was up 10.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.85 earnings per share. FirstEnergy has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.500-2.560 EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that FirstEnergy will post 2.66 EPS for the current fiscal year.

FirstEnergy Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, December 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 7th will be issued a dividend of $0.445 per share. This represents a $1.78 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.8%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 7th. FirstEnergy’s payout ratio is 77.73%.

Institutional Trading of FirstEnergy

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of FirstEnergy by 1.3% during the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 66,988,086 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $2,696,940,000 after purchasing an additional 837,872 shares during the last quarter. Boston Partners grew its holdings in shares of FirstEnergy by 14.9% during the first quarter. Boston Partners now owns 18,962,859 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $767,952,000 after purchasing an additional 2,459,779 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of FirstEnergy by 1.1% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 13,091,114 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $524,764,000 after purchasing an additional 146,742 shares during the last quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. grew its holdings in shares of FirstEnergy by 198.1% during the second quarter. Federated Hermes Inc. now owns 6,888,967 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $277,350,000 after purchasing an additional 4,578,375 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc boosted its holdings in FirstEnergy by 8.6% in the second quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 4,715,098 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $189,830,000 after acquiring an additional 374,053 shares during the last quarter. 89.41% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About FirstEnergy

FirstEnergy Corp., through its subsidiaries, generates, transmits, and distributes electricity in the United States. It operates through Regulated Distribution and Regulated Transmission segments. The company owns and operates coal-fired, nuclear, hydroelectric, wind, and solar power generating facilities.