Murphy Middleton Hinkle & Parker Inc. Has $1.60 Million Stock Holdings in Chevron Co. (NYSE:CVX)

Murphy Middleton Hinkle & Parker Inc. trimmed its position in shares of Chevron Co. (NYSE:CVX) by 5.2% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 11,050 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock after selling 605 shares during the quarter. Murphy Middleton Hinkle & Parker Inc.’s holdings in Chevron were worth $1,600,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in CVX. State Street Corp lifted its stake in shares of Chevron by 0.6% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 159,105,244 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $23,431,429,000 after acquiring an additional 874,962 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Chevron by 11.5% in the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 31,108,760 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $4,581,137,000 after acquiring an additional 3,203,899 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Chevron by 3.6% in the third quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 19,482,388 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $2,869,171,000 after acquiring an additional 672,244 shares during the period. Franklin Resources Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Chevron by 3.4% in the third quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 17,200,188 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $2,610,645,000 after acquiring an additional 573,218 shares during the period. Finally, Ameriprise Financial Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Chevron by 3.0% in the second quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 17,111,051 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock worth $2,676,957,000 after acquiring an additional 501,969 shares during the period. 72.42% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently commented on CVX shares. Bank of America started coverage on Chevron in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $168.00 price objective on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Chevron from $171.00 to $188.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 9th. Citigroup raised Chevron from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $145.00 to $185.00 in a research note on Tuesday, November 26th. Scotiabank lowered their target price on Chevron from $180.00 to $163.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 10th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their target price on Chevron from $194.00 to $195.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 3rd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and thirteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $175.27.

Chevron Trading Up 1.4 %

NYSE CVX opened at $161.54 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $290.30 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.75, a P/E/G ratio of 2.62 and a beta of 1.12. Chevron Co. has a 52 week low of $135.37 and a 52 week high of $167.11. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $153.93 and a 200-day moving average price of $151.05. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 1.07 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13.

Chevron (NYSE:CVX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Friday, November 1st. The oil and gas company reported $2.51 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.47 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $50.67 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $48.86 billion. Chevron had a return on equity of 13.15% and a net margin of 8.44%. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 6.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.05 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts expect that Chevron Co. will post 10.39 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Chevron Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, December 10th. Investors of record on Monday, November 18th were given a dividend of $1.63 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, November 18th. This represents a $6.52 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.04%. Chevron’s payout ratio is 71.65%.

Insider Activity at Chevron

In related news, CEO Michael K. Wirth sold 164,600 shares of Chevron stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $160.13, for a total transaction of $26,357,398.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 4,280 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $685,356.40. The trade was a 97.47 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. 0.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Chevron

Chevron Corporation, through its subsidiaries, engages in the integrated energy and chemicals operations in the United States and internationally. The company operates in two segments, Upstream and Downstream. The Upstream segment is involved in the exploration, development, production, and transportation of crude oil and natural gas; processing, liquefaction, transportation, and regasification of liquefied natural gas; transportation of crude oil through pipelines; transportation, storage, and marketing of natural gas; and carbon capture and storage, as well as a gas-to-liquids plant.