Exencial Wealth Advisors LLC Has $2.49 Million Stock Holdings in Verizon Communications Inc. $VZ

Exencial Wealth Advisors LLC cut its holdings in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 7.0% in the second quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 57,560 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after selling 4,320 shares during the quarter. Exencial Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $2,491,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in VZ. GQG Partners LLC lifted its stake in Verizon Communications by 303.9% in the first quarter. GQG Partners LLC now owns 49,859,967 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $2,261,648,000 after acquiring an additional 37,516,167 shares during the last quarter. Nuveen LLC acquired a new stake in Verizon Communications in the first quarter valued at approximately $661,720,000. Pacer Advisors Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 737.5% in the first quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 11,697,003 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $530,576,000 after buying an additional 10,300,369 shares during the last quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 301.2% in the first quarter. Acadian Asset Management LLC now owns 8,504,920 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $385,750,000 after buying an additional 6,385,197 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 20.6% in the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 31,626,373 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $1,434,572,000 after buying an additional 5,392,416 shares during the last quarter. 62.06% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on VZ. Arete Research upgraded shares of Verizon Communications to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 8th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $47.00 to $48.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 22nd. Wall Street Zen cut shares of Verizon Communications from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, September 26th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $47.00 to $49.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 22nd. Finally, Scotiabank boosted their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $50.00 to $50.50 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have assigned a Buy rating and thirteen have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $47.41.

Verizon Communications Trading Down 1.1%

Shares of VZ stock opened at $39.86 on Thursday. Verizon Communications Inc. has a 1 year low of $37.58 and a 1 year high of $47.35. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $43.05 and its 200 day simple moving average is $43.01. The firm has a market capitalization of $168.04 billion, a P/E ratio of 9.29, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.04 and a beta of 0.37. The company has a current ratio of 0.64, a quick ratio of 0.60 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.19.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last announced its earnings results on Monday, July 21st. The cell phone carrier reported $1.22 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.19 by $0.03. Verizon Communications had a net margin of 13.28% and a return on equity of 19.61%. The business had revenue of $34.50 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $33.47 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.15 earnings per share. Verizon Communications’s revenue was up 5.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.69 EPS for the current year.

Verizon Communications Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 3rd. Investors of record on Friday, October 10th will be given a dividend of $0.69 per share. This represents a $2.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 6.9%. This is an increase from Verizon Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.68. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 10th. Verizon Communications’s payout ratio is presently 64.34%.

Verizon Communications Profile

Verizon Communications Inc, through its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of communications, technology, information, and entertainment products and services to consumers, businesses, and governmental entities worldwide. It operates in two segments, Verizon Consumer Group (Consumer) and Verizon Business Group (Business).