Huntsman Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:HUN)

Huntsman Co. (NYSE:HUN) was the recipient of unusually large options trading activity on Friday. Stock investors acquired 40,557 put options on the company. This represents an increase of 1,514% compared to the average daily volume of 2,513 put options.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Pathstone Family Office LLC raised its holdings in shares of Huntsman by 3.4% during the 4th quarter. Pathstone Family Office LLC now owns 12,569 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $156,000 after purchasing an additional 418 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning raised its holdings in Huntsman by 1.1% in the 2nd quarter. Creative Planning now owns 41,382 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,173,000 after acquiring an additional 444 shares during the period. Dumont & Blake Investment Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Huntsman by 1.7% in the 1st quarter. Dumont & Blake Investment Advisors LLC now owns 30,817 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $802,000 after acquiring an additional 505 shares during the period. Quadrant Capital Group LLC raised its holdings in Huntsman by 93.0% in the 4th quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 1,081 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $27,000 after acquiring an additional 521 shares during the period. Finally, Verdence Capital Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Huntsman by 5.0% in the 3rd quarter. Verdence Capital Advisors LLC now owns 11,628 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $284,000 after acquiring an additional 557 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 84.81% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently commented on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company raised shares of Huntsman from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $25.00 to $32.00 in a research note on Friday, February 23rd. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on shares of Huntsman from $20.00 to $24.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, February 23rd. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price objective on shares of Huntsman from $25.00 to $28.00 and gave the stock a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 5th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price objective on shares of Huntsman from $30.00 to $29.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 24th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $26.55.

Huntsman Stock Down 0.0 %

Shares of NYSE:HUN traded down $0.01 during trading on Friday, reaching $23.71. 305,673 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,955,424. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $25.21 and a 200 day simple moving average of $24.62. The firm has a market cap of $4.10 billion, a P/E ratio of 44.75 and a beta of 1.12. Huntsman has a 1-year low of $22.14 and a 1-year high of $29.90. The company has a quick ratio of 1.23, a current ratio of 1.97 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.48.

Huntsman (NYSE:HUN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 22nd. The basic materials company reported ($0.21) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.14) by ($0.07). The company had revenue of $1.40 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.33 billion. Huntsman had a net margin of 1.65% and a return on equity of 1.92%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 15.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.04 EPS. Analysts anticipate that Huntsman will post 0.47 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Huntsman Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 29th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 15th were issued a dividend of $0.25 per share. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 14th. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.22%. This is an increase from Huntsman’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.24. Huntsman’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 188.68%.

About Huntsman

Huntsman Corporation manufactures and sells diversified organic chemical products worldwide. The company operates in three segments: Polyurethanes, Performance Products, and Advanced Materials. The Polyurethanes segment offers polyurethane chemicals, including methyl diphenyl diisocyanate, polyether and polyester polyols, and thermoplastic polyurethane; and aniline, benzene, nitrobenzene and other co-products.