Canadian National Railway (NYSE:CNI) Upgraded at Vertical Research

Vertical Research upgraded shares of Canadian National Railway (NYSE:CNI) (TSE:CNR) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a report issued on Monday morning, MarketBeat Ratings reports.

Several other research analysts also recently commented on the stock. Citigroup increased their price objective on shares of Canadian National Railway from $119.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, November 3rd. Susquehanna increased their price target on Canadian National Railway from $115.00 to $116.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a report on Monday, November 3rd. Cibc Captl Mkts upgraded Canadian National Railway from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 28th. Royal Bank Of Canada upped their price objective on Canadian National Railway from $148.00 to $158.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, November 3rd. Finally, CIBC upgraded Canadian National Railway from a “neutral” rating to an “outperformer” rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $146.00 to $151.00 in a research report on Friday, November 28th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have assigned a Buy rating, nine have issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Canadian National Railway presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $117.36.

Canadian National Railway Trading Down 3.9%

Shares of Canadian National Railway stock opened at $96.72 on Monday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $96.73 and its 200-day simple moving average is $96.78. Canadian National Railway has a 1-year low of $90.74 and a 1-year high of $108.75. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.92, a current ratio of 0.60 and a quick ratio of 0.42. The stock has a market capitalization of $59.52 billion, a PE ratio of 18.35, a P/E/G ratio of 2.09 and a beta of 0.96.

Canadian National Railway (NYSE:CNI) (TSE:CNR) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Friday, October 31st. The transportation company reported $1.33 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.28 by $0.05. Canadian National Railway had a return on equity of 21.50% and a net margin of 26.86%.The firm had revenue of $2.99 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.15 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $1.72 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.3% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Canadian National Railway will post 5.52 earnings per share for the current year.

Canadian National Railway Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, December 30th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, December 9th were given a dividend of $0.8875 per share. This is a boost from Canadian National Railway’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.65. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, December 9th. This represents a $3.55 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.7%. Canadian National Railway’s payout ratio is 48.01%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Canadian National Railway

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in CNI. Lazard Asset Management LLC grew its stake in Canadian National Railway by 639,137.0% in the third quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC now owns 8,955,711 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $844,353,000 after purchasing an additional 8,954,310 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Canadian National Railway in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $591,904,000. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC purchased a new position in shares of Canadian National Railway in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $310,489,000. Fisher Asset Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Canadian National Railway during the 2nd quarter worth approximately $189,748,000. Finally, Troy Asset Management Ltd lifted its position in Canadian National Railway by 158.8% during the third quarter. Troy Asset Management Ltd now owns 2,738,372 shares of the transportation company’s stock valued at $258,220,000 after acquiring an additional 1,680,223 shares during the last quarter. 80.74% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Canadian National Railway Company Profile

Canadian National Railway Company (NYSE: CNI) is a Class I freight railway that operates an integrated rail network across Canada and the United States. Headquartered in Montreal, Quebec, CN provides long-haul freight transportation and related logistics services that connect major ports, industrial centers and inland markets throughout North America. Its transcontinental system enables cross-border movement of goods and supports supply chains that span coast-to-coast in Canada and into the central and eastern United States.

CN’s core business is the railborne transportation of a broad mix of commodities, including intermodal container traffic, forest and paper products, grain and other agricultural products, metallurgical and industrial products, petroleum and chemical products, coal and automotive shipments.