Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL) Short Interest Up 14.8% in January

Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL) was the target of a significant increase in short interest in the month of January. As of January 31st, there was short interest totalling 6,840,000 shares, an increase of 14.8% from the January 15th total of 5,960,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 4,220,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 1.6 days. Approximately 0.2% of the shares of the company are short sold.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Shell

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of SHEL. SG Americas Securities LLC bought a new position in Shell in the third quarter valued at approximately $121,000. Creative Planning boosted its stake in Shell by 4.8% in the third quarter. Creative Planning now owns 306,491 shares of the energy company’s stock valued at $20,213,000 after acquiring an additional 13,904 shares during the last quarter. Good Life Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Shell by 11.9% in the third quarter. Good Life Advisors LLC now owns 4,368 shares of the energy company’s stock valued at $288,000 after acquiring an additional 463 shares during the last quarter. Cardinal Capital Management boosted its stake in Shell by 0.8% in the third quarter. Cardinal Capital Management now owns 55,362 shares of the energy company’s stock valued at $3,651,000 after acquiring an additional 418 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Ellsworth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Shell by 18.4% in the third quarter. Ellsworth Advisors LLC now owns 20,885 shares of the energy company’s stock valued at $1,377,000 after acquiring an additional 3,239 shares during the last quarter. 28.60% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently weighed in on SHEL. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their target price on shares of Shell from $86.00 to $82.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, January 31st. UBS Group upgraded shares of Shell from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. Piper Sandler dropped their price target on shares of Shell from $82.00 to $72.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Wolfe Research raised shares of Shell from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $80.00 price target for the company in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised shares of Shell from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price target for the stock from $66.50 to $79.80 in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have issued a buy rating and three have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $79.11.

Shell Price Performance

Shares of NYSE SHEL traded down $0.22 during mid-day trading on Monday, hitting $67.16. 2,934,808 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,037,361. The company has a market cap of $205.33 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.38, a PEG ratio of 0.98 and a beta of 0.54. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $64.56 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $66.89. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36, a quick ratio of 1.10 and a current ratio of 1.35. Shell has a twelve month low of $60.15 and a twelve month high of $74.61.

Shell (NYSE:SHEL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 30th. The energy company reported $1.20 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.74 by ($0.54). Shell had a net margin of 5.57% and a return on equity of 12.75%. As a group, analysts forecast that Shell will post 7.46 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Shell Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 24th. Investors of record on Friday, February 14th will be issued a $0.716 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 14th. This represents a $2.86 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.26%. This is a positive change from Shell’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.69. Shell’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 54.78%.

About Shell

Shell plc operates as an energy and petrochemical company Europe, Asia, Oceania, Africa, the United States, and Rest of the Americas. The company operates through Integrated Gas, Upstream, Marketing, Chemicals and Products, and Renewables and Energy Solutions segments. It explores for and extracts crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids; markets and transports oil and gas; produces gas-to-liquids fuels and other products; and operates upstream and midstream infrastructure to deliver gas to market.