Cookson Peirce & Co. Inc. Purchases 1,542 Shares of HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ)

Cookson Peirce & Co. Inc. lifted its position in shares of HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) by 7.4% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 22,259 shares of the computer maker’s stock after buying an additional 1,542 shares during the quarter. Cookson Peirce & Co. Inc.’s holdings in HP were worth $670,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in HPQ. Cantor Fitzgerald Investment Advisor L.P increased its stake in HP by 89.9% during the 1st quarter. Cantor Fitzgerald Investment Advisor L.P now owns 873,243 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $31,698,000 after acquiring an additional 413,491 shares during the period. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board increased its stake in HP by 46.6% during the 1st quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 305,877 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $11,103,000 after acquiring an additional 97,178 shares during the period. Prudential PLC bought a new position in HP during the 1st quarter worth $892,000. Cetera Investment Advisers increased its stake in HP by 6.8% during the 1st quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 17,651 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $641,000 after acquiring an additional 1,121 shares during the period. Finally, Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC bought a new position in HP during the 1st quarter worth $309,000. Institutional investors own 77.53% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have commented on the company. StockNews.com lowered HP from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, March 1st. Barclays lifted their price target on HP from $22.00 to $24.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 29th. Finally, HSBC upgraded HP from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price target for the company from $30.00 to $33.00 in a research note on Wednesday, February 14th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has assigned a hold rating and eight have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, HP presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $33.11.

HP Stock Down 0.6 %

NYSE HPQ opened at $27.79 on Wednesday. HP Inc. has a twelve month low of $25.22 and a twelve month high of $33.90. The company has a market cap of $27.25 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 8.12, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.34 and a beta of 1.05. The business’s fifty day moving average is $29.37 and its 200 day moving average is $28.78.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 28th. The computer maker reported $0.81 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.81. HP had a negative return on equity of 181.02% and a net margin of 6.45%. The company had revenue of $13.19 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $13.56 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.75 EPS. HP’s revenue for the quarter was down 4.4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts anticipate that HP Inc. will post 3.42 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

HP Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, April 3rd. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 13th were issued a dividend of $0.2756 per share. This represents a $1.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.97%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, March 12th. HP’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 32.16%.

Insider Activity at HP

In other HP news, Director Robert R. Bennett sold 67,000 shares of HP stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $30.01, for a total transaction of $2,010,670.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 60,216 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,807,082.16. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other HP news, insider Stephanie Liebman sold 8,708 shares of HP stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $30.93, for a total transaction of $269,338.44. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Robert R. Bennett sold 67,000 shares of HP stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $30.01, for a total value of $2,010,670.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 60,216 shares in the company, valued at $1,807,082.16. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 116,723 shares of company stock valued at $3,479,287 in the last 90 days. 0.41% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

HP Company Profile

HP Inc provides products, technologies, software, solutions, and services to individual consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses, and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health, and education sectors worldwide. It operates through Personal Systems and Printing segments. The Personal Systems segment offers commercial personal computers (PCs), consumer PCs, workstations, thin clients, commercial tablets and mobility devices, retail point-of-sale systems, displays and other related accessories, software, support, and services for the commercial and consumer markets.