Americana Partners LLC Buys New Position in HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ)

Americana Partners LLC bought a new stake in shares of HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor bought 231,214 shares of the computer maker’s stock, valued at approximately $7,545,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in HPQ. State Street Corp raised its holdings in shares of HP by 8.2% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 51,801,428 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $1,871,046,000 after acquiring an additional 3,923,161 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of HP by 11.1% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 24,770,491 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $885,877,000 after acquiring an additional 2,477,977 shares in the last quarter. KBC Group NV raised its holdings in shares of HP by 145.1% during the fourth quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 3,555,989 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $116,031,000 after acquiring an additional 2,105,104 shares in the last quarter. C2P Capital Advisory Group LLC d.b.a. Prosperity Capital Advisors bought a new position in shares of HP during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $65,260,000. Finally, Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its holdings in shares of HP by 11.4% during the third quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 14,184,306 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $508,791,000 after acquiring an additional 1,455,138 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 77.53% of the company’s stock.

HP Trading Up 1.2 %

NYSE HPQ opened at $33.69 on Monday. HP Inc. has a 12 month low of $27.42 and a 12 month high of $39.79. The stock has a market cap of $31.59 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.99, a P/E/G ratio of 2.78 and a beta of 1.05. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $33.17 and its 200-day moving average price is $34.83.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 26th. The computer maker reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.93. HP had a negative return on equity of 253.39% and a net margin of 5.18%. The company had revenue of $14.06 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $13.99 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.90 earnings per share. HP’s revenue was up 1.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts forecast that HP Inc. will post 3.56 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

HP Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 12th will be given a dividend of $0.2894 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, March 12th. This represents a $1.16 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.44%. HP’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 41.28%.

Insider Activity at HP

In other HP news, insider Alex Cho sold 10,298 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.32, for a total value of $353,427.36. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 64,676 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,219,680.32. This represents a 13.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Enrique Lores sold 137,094 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $36.45, for a total value of $4,997,076.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 89,272 shares in the company, valued at $3,253,964.40. This trade represents a 60.56 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 273,035 shares of company stock valued at $9,670,068 over the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.41% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

HPQ has been the subject of a number of research reports. Sanford C. Bernstein increased their price objective on HP from $32.00 to $34.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Citigroup decreased their price objective on HP from $37.00 to $36.50 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, November 27th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price objective on HP from $42.00 to $41.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, November 20th. Barclays increased their price objective on HP from $32.00 to $35.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 27th. Finally, TD Cowen increased their price objective on HP from $32.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 27th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $36.23.

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.