Citigroup Inc. Grows Stock Holdings in TELUS Corporation $TU

Citigroup Inc. lifted its position in shares of TELUS Corporation (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 69.2% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 1,932,604 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 790,288 shares during the period. Citigroup Inc. owned 0.13% of TELUS worth $30,446,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the business. Hillsdale Investment Management Inc. raised its position in TELUS by 15.9% during the 3rd quarter. Hillsdale Investment Management Inc. now owns 26,685 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $420,000 after purchasing an additional 3,652 shares during the last quarter. Fiera Capital Corp raised its holdings in TELUS by 10.7% in the 3rd quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 17,867,796 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $281,326,000 after purchasing an additional 1,725,982 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of TELUS by 4.6% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 28,553,587 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $449,748,000 after purchasing an additional 1,255,029 shares during the period. Tobam lifted its position in shares of TELUS by 3.6% in the 3rd quarter. Tobam now owns 112,948 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $1,781,000 after purchasing an additional 3,933 shares during the period. Finally, PNC Financial Services Group Inc. boosted its stake in shares of TELUS by 13.4% during the 3rd quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 17,636 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $278,000 after purchasing an additional 2,082 shares in the last quarter. 49.40% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts have commented on the stock. BMO Capital Markets lowered shares of TELUS from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 11th. Citigroup upgraded TELUS to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 4th. Wall Street Zen cut TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Saturday, February 21st. Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of TELUS in a research report on Monday, December 29th. Finally, National Bank Financial reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of TELUS in a research report on Thursday, December 4th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $18.17.

TELUS Trading Down 0.6%

TELUS stock opened at $13.47 on Thursday. TELUS Corporation has a 12 month low of $12.54 and a 12 month high of $16.74. The company has a market capitalization of $20.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.60 and a beta of 0.67. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $13.49 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $14.49. The company has a current ratio of 0.86, a quick ratio of 0.81 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.65.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 12th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.15 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.18 by ($0.03). TELUS had a return on equity of 8.42% and a net margin of 5.42%.The company had revenue of $3.83 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.85 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.25 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that TELUS Corporation will post 0.71 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

TELUS Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 1st. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 11th will be given a dividend of $0.4184 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, March 11th. This represents a $1.67 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 12.4%. TELUS’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 230.77%.

About TELUS

TELUS Corporation (NYSE: TU) is a Canadian telecommunications and technology company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia. It delivers a broad portfolio of consumer and business communications services across Canada, including mobile wireless, fixed-line voice, broadband internet, and television. TELUS also provides a range of enterprise services such as cloud and IT solutions, managed network services, cybersecurity and Internet of Things (IoT) offerings for business customers.

Beyond core connectivity, TELUS has expanded into health and digital services.