Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) Given Consensus Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) has received a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” from the ten brokerages that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating on the company. The average 12 month price objective among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is C$79.32.

Several equities research analysts have recently weighed in on FTS shares. TD upped their price objective on Fortis from C$83.00 to C$84.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 7th. National Bank Financial raised their target price on Fortis from C$75.00 to C$82.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Monday, June 1st. Raymond James Financial boosted their price target on Fortis from C$78.50 to C$80.50 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 28th. Finally, Barclays lowered their price target on Fortis from C$84.00 to C$83.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, May 8th.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortis

In other news, insider James Reid sold 421 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, June 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of C$79.05, for a total value of C$33,280.05. Following the sale, the insider owned 31,283 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately C$2,472,921.15. This represents a 1.33% decrease in their position. Over the last 90 days, insiders have bought 572 shares of company stock valued at $45,909. 0.04% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Fortis Stock Performance

TSE FTS opened at C$82.42 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of C$41.96 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.31, a PEG ratio of 3.01 and a beta of 0.41. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is C$79.15 and its 200 day simple moving average is C$77.02. Fortis has a twelve month low of C$64.42 and a twelve month high of C$82.80. The company has a quick ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.49 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 145.23.

Fortis (TSE:FTS) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 6th. The company reported C$0.99 EPS for the quarter. The firm had revenue of C$3.40 billion during the quarter. Fortis had a net margin of 14.75% and a return on equity of 7.51%. As a group, research analysts forecast that Fortis will post 3.3419913 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 1st were paid a $0.64 dividend. This represents a $2.56 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.1%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, May 15th. Fortis’s payout ratio is currently 74.04%.

Fortis Company Profile

Fortis owns and operates 10 utility transmission and distribution assets in Canada and the United States, serving more than 3.4 million electricity and gas customers. The company has smaller stakes in electricity generation and several Caribbean utilities. ITC operates electric transmission in seven U.S. states, with more than 16,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in operation serving a peak load in excess of 23 gigawatts.