Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. Buys 116 Shares of HCA Healthcare, Inc. (NYSE:HCA)

Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. lifted its position in HCA Healthcare, Inc. (NYSE:HCA) by 4.0% during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 3,022 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 116 shares during the period. Brown Brothers Harriman & Co.’s holdings in HCA Healthcare were worth $907,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Whipplewood Advisors LLC acquired a new position in shares of HCA Healthcare in the 4th quarter valued at $31,000. Tidemark LLC bought a new stake in shares of HCA Healthcare in the fourth quarter worth about $36,000. Legacy Investment Solutions LLC acquired a new position in shares of HCA Healthcare in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $39,000. Activest Wealth Management raised its holdings in HCA Healthcare by 1,250.0% during the 4th quarter. Activest Wealth Management now owns 135 shares of the company’s stock worth $40,000 after buying an additional 125 shares during the period. Finally, Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. increased its position in shares of HCA Healthcare by 50.0% during the fourth quarter. Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. now owns 150 shares of the company’s stock worth $45,000 after acquiring an additional 50 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 62.73% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research firms have issued reports on HCA. Cantor Fitzgerald reiterated an “overweight” rating and set a $405.00 target price on shares of HCA Healthcare in a report on Monday, January 27th. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price target on HCA Healthcare from $405.00 to $384.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 27th. Bank of America cut their price objective on shares of HCA Healthcare from $380.00 to $370.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, January 27th. Barclays lowered their price target on shares of HCA Healthcare from $392.00 to $366.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, January 27th. Finally, KeyCorp lowered their target price on HCA Healthcare from $420.00 to $370.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, thirteen have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $385.67.

HCA Healthcare Trading Down 0.0 %

Shares of HCA Healthcare stock opened at $342.25 on Monday. The company has a market capitalization of $84.26 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 15.58, a P/E/G ratio of 1.10 and a beta of 1.68. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $324.53 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $340.92. HCA Healthcare, Inc. has a 1 year low of $289.98 and a 1 year high of $417.14. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 69.07, a current ratio of 1.08 and a quick ratio of 0.97.

HCA Healthcare (NYSE:HCA) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Friday, January 24th. The company reported $6.22 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $6.03 by $0.19. HCA Healthcare had a net margin of 8.16% and a return on equity of 586.47%. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $5.90 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that HCA Healthcare, Inc. will post 24.98 EPS for the current year.

HCA Healthcare Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 31st. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 17th will be issued a $0.72 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 17th. This represents a $2.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.84%. This is an increase from HCA Healthcare’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.66. HCA Healthcare’s payout ratio is currently 13.11%.

Insider Activity

In other HCA Healthcare news, SVP Jennifer Berres sold 9,533 shares of HCA Healthcare stock in a transaction on Friday, February 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $322.59, for a total value of $3,075,250.47. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 15,412 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,971,757.08. The trade was a 38.22 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 1.30% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About HCA Healthcare

HCA Healthcare, Inc, through its subsidiaries, owns and operates hospitals and related healthcare entities in the United States. It operates general and acute care hospitals that offers medical and surgical services, including inpatient care, intensive care, cardiac care, diagnostic, and emergency services; and outpatient services, such as outpatient surgery, laboratory, radiology, respiratory therapy, cardiology, and physical therapy.