Brown Financial Advisors Boosts Holdings in NextEra Energy, Inc. (NYSE:NEE)

Brown Financial Advisors lifted its stake in shares of NextEra Energy, Inc. (NYSE:NEE) by 9.7% during the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 17,558 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,554 shares during the period. Brown Financial Advisors’ holdings in NextEra Energy were worth $1,259,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Nordea Investment Management AB raised its stake in NextEra Energy by 20.9% during the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 8,833,725 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $634,703,000 after purchasing an additional 1,525,436 shares during the period. National Bank of Canada FI increased its holdings in shares of NextEra Energy by 167.7% during the 3rd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 2,186,225 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $184,795,000 after buying an additional 1,369,689 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of NextEra Energy by 2.0% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 42,418,748 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $3,571,650,000 after buying an additional 820,704 shares during the period. RWC Asset Management LLP boosted its holdings in NextEra Energy by 313.0% in the fourth quarter. RWC Asset Management LLP now owns 673,317 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $48,270,000 after acquiring an additional 510,302 shares during the last quarter. Finally, National Pension Service grew its position in NextEra Energy by 14.2% during the third quarter. National Pension Service now owns 3,960,232 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $334,758,000 after acquiring an additional 491,462 shares during the period. 78.72% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on NEE shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price objective on NextEra Energy from $99.00 to $90.00 in a research note on Monday, January 27th. Scotiabank raised their price target on shares of NextEra Energy from $92.00 to $96.00 and gave the company a “sector outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 12th. Evercore ISI decreased their price objective on shares of NextEra Energy from $84.00 to $79.00 and set an “in-line” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, January 27th. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of NextEra Energy from $93.00 to $94.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 23rd. Finally, BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on shares of NextEra Energy from $82.00 to $84.00 in a research report on Monday, January 27th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $85.85.

NextEra Energy Trading Down 1.2 %

Shares of NEE opened at $70.72 on Tuesday. NextEra Energy, Inc. has a one year low of $53.95 and a one year high of $86.10. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $70.48 and a 200 day moving average price of $76.50. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.20, a quick ratio of 0.38 and a current ratio of 0.47. The company has a market capitalization of $145.48 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.99, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 0.58.

NextEra Energy (NYSE:NEE) last announced its earnings results on Friday, January 24th. The utilities provider reported $0.53 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.53. NextEra Energy had a return on equity of 11.85% and a net margin of 28.06%. Sell-side analysts forecast that NextEra Energy, Inc. will post 3.68 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NextEra Energy Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 17th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 28th will be given a $0.5665 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 28th. This represents a $2.27 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.20%. This is an increase from NextEra Energy’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.52. NextEra Energy’s payout ratio is presently 67.06%.

Insider Activity

In related news, CAO James Michael May sold 2,383 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $68.09, for a total value of $162,258.47. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 27,427 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,867,504.43. The trade was a 7.99 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Company insiders own 0.18% of the company’s stock.

About NextEra Energy

NextEra Energy, Inc, through its subsidiaries, generates, transmits, distributes, and sells electric power to retail and wholesale customers in North America. The company generates electricity through wind, solar, nuclear,natural gas, and other clean energy. It also develops, constructs, and operates long-term contracted assets that consists of clean energy solutions, such as renewable generation facilities, battery storage projects, and electric transmission facilities; sells energy commodities; and owns, develops, constructs, manages and operates electric generation facilities in wholesale energy markets.