CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) Upgraded at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) from a sell rating to a hold rating in a research note released on Saturday morning.

A number of other equities research analysts also recently issued reports on the company. Scotiabank boosted their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $42.00 to $45.00 and gave the company a “sector outperform” rating in a research note on Friday. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $40.00 to $41.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 21st. Morgan Stanley boosted their target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $37.00 to $39.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 21st. Mizuho set a $42.00 target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy in a research report on Tuesday, October 21st. Finally, UBS Group boosted their price objective on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $44.00 to $46.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, October 10th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $41.50.

CenterPoint Energy Trading Up 0.4%

NYSE:CNP opened at $39.70 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.51, a quick ratio of 0.38 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.76. CenterPoint Energy has a 12 month low of $28.57 and a 12 month high of $40.50. The company has a market cap of $25.92 billion, a PE ratio of 25.13, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 0.57. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $38.58 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $37.71.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, October 23rd. The utilities provider reported $0.50 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.46 by $0.04. CenterPoint Energy had a net margin of 11.37% and a return on equity of 10.25%. The business had revenue of $1.99 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.04 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.31 EPS. Research analysts forecast that CenterPoint Energy will post 1.75 earnings per share for the current year.

CenterPoint Energy Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 11th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, November 20th will be given a $0.22 dividend. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.2%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, November 20th. CenterPoint Energy’s dividend payout ratio is presently 55.70%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of CNP. Brighton Jones LLC bought a new position in CenterPoint Energy in the 4th quarter worth $254,000. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 29.3% in the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 14,818 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $537,000 after acquiring an additional 3,359 shares during the period. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC boosted its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 106.9% in the first quarter. Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services LLC now owns 74,108 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $2,685,000 after acquiring an additional 38,292 shares during the period. Asset Management One Co. Ltd. boosted its stake in CenterPoint Energy by 5.1% in the 1st quarter. Asset Management One Co. Ltd. now owns 261,285 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $9,466,000 after purchasing an additional 12,633 shares during the period. Finally, Spire Wealth Management boosted its stake in CenterPoint Energy by 802.1% in the 1st quarter. Spire Wealth Management now owns 1,281 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $46,000 after purchasing an additional 1,139 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 91.77% of the company’s stock.

About CenterPoint Energy

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.