Greenline Partners LLC Invests $138,000 in The Southern Company (NYSE:SO)

Greenline Partners LLC purchased a new stake in The Southern Company (NYSE:SO) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor purchased 1,677 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $138,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Southern in the fourth quarter worth approximately $848,019,000. Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Southern during the fourth quarter worth $315,290,000. Marshall Wace LLP raised its position in shares of Southern by 325.7% in the fourth quarter. Marshall Wace LLP now owns 4,322,931 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $355,864,000 after buying an additional 3,307,527 shares during the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC lifted its stake in shares of Southern by 562.9% in the fourth quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 1,368,788 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $112,679,000 after buying an additional 1,162,288 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Southern by 0.7% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 102,790,453 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $8,461,710,000 after acquiring an additional 698,422 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 64.10% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have weighed in on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised shares of Southern from an “underweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $94.00 target price on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, April 8th. Guggenheim reissued a “neutral” rating and set a $93.00 price objective on shares of Southern in a research note on Friday, May 2nd. Mizuho raised their target price on Southern from $83.00 to $85.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, February 3rd. UBS Group boosted their price target on shares of Southern from $94.00 to $97.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, March 21st. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on shares of Southern from $95.00 to $99.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Ten analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $93.07.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Southern news, CEO James Jeffrey Peoples sold 14,540 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $86.00, for a total transaction of $1,250,440.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 13,236 shares in the company, valued at $1,138,296. This represents a 52.35 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Kimberly S. Greene sold 32,190 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $93.12, for a total value of $2,997,532.80. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 106,819 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,946,985.28. This represents a 23.16 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 47,855 shares of company stock valued at $4,348,784 in the last ninety days. Company insiders own 0.16% of the company’s stock.

Southern Stock Up 0.1 %

Southern stock opened at $90.37 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.60, a quick ratio of 0.66 and a current ratio of 0.67. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $90.24 and a 200 day moving average price of $87.36. The Southern Company has a fifty-two week low of $76.64 and a fifty-two week high of $94.45. The company has a market capitalization of $99.32 billion, a PE ratio of 22.54, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.01 and a beta of 0.40.

Southern (NYSE:SO) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 1st. The utilities provider reported $1.23 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.20 by $0.03. Southern had a return on equity of 12.23% and a net margin of 16.47%. The firm had revenue of $7.78 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.17 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.03 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 17.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts expect that The Southern Company will post 4.29 earnings per share for the current year.

Southern Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, June 6th. Investors of record on Monday, May 19th will be issued a $0.74 dividend. This represents a $2.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.28%. This is a boost from Southern’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.72. Southern’s payout ratio is 70.64%.

Southern Profile

The Southern Company, through its subsidiaries, engages in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity. The company also develops, constructs, acquires, owns, and manages power generation assets, including renewable energy projects and sells electricity in the wholesale market; and distributes natural gas in Illinois, Georgia, Virginia, and Tennessee, as well as provides gas marketing services, gas distribution operations, and gas pipeline investments operations.