Legal & General Group Plc Has $19.02 Million Holdings in NorthWestern Corporation $NWE

Legal & General Group Plc cut its stake in shares of NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ:NWE) by 7.7% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 294,648 shares of the company’s stock after selling 24,550 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc owned 0.48% of NorthWestern worth $19,017,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Hantz Financial Services Inc. lifted its position in NorthWestern by 42.6% during the fourth quarter. Hantz Financial Services Inc. now owns 1,145 shares of the company’s stock worth $74,000 after acquiring an additional 342 shares during the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC increased its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 35.6% during the fourth quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 2,188 shares of the company’s stock worth $141,000 after purchasing an additional 575 shares during the period. Global Retirement Partners LLC increased its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 108.5% during the fourth quarter. Global Retirement Partners LLC now owns 3,451 shares of the company’s stock worth $223,000 after purchasing an additional 1,796 shares during the period. IFP Advisors Inc increased its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 142.0% during the fourth quarter. IFP Advisors Inc now owns 455 shares of the company’s stock worth $29,000 after purchasing an additional 267 shares during the period. Finally, Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. increased its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 1.6% during the fourth quarter. Envestnet Portfolio Solutions Inc. now owns 19,984 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,290,000 after purchasing an additional 322 shares during the period. 96.07% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

NWE has been the topic of several recent research reports. Wells Fargo & Company reaffirmed an “underweight” rating and set a $54.00 target price on shares of NorthWestern in a report on Tuesday, April 21st. Wall Street Zen raised shares of NorthWestern to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, April 25th. Barclays raised their target price on shares of NorthWestern from $62.00 to $75.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, April 20th. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of NorthWestern in a report on Tuesday, May 26th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of NorthWestern from $64.00 to $67.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 21st. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $68.30.

NorthWestern Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NWE opened at $68.23 on Tuesday. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $70.08 and its 200 day simple moving average is $68.24. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.20 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.73 and a beta of 0.34. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.10, a current ratio of 0.70 and a quick ratio of 0.52. NorthWestern Corporation has a 1 year low of $50.46 and a 1 year high of $75.18.

NorthWestern (NASDAQ:NWE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The company reported $1.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.29 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $516.60 million for the quarter. NorthWestern had a net margin of 10.21% and a return on equity of 7.80%. The business’s revenue was up 6.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.22 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts predict that NorthWestern Corporation will post 3.75 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NorthWestern Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 30th. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 15th will be paid a dividend of $0.67 per share. This represents a $2.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.9%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 15th. NorthWestern’s payout ratio is presently 98.53%.

NorthWestern Profile

NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ: NWE) is a regulated energy company that delivers electricity and natural gas to residential, commercial and industrial customers. Through its Electric Operations and Gas Operations segments, the company operates an extensive network of distribution lines, substations and pipelines. NorthWestern’s services encompass the delivery of power sourced from regional transmission systems and the procurement, storage and distribution of natural gas to end users.

Electric delivery services include the management of distribution infrastructure, customer metering and system reliability programs.