Piedmont Office Realty Trust (NYSE:PDM) Trading 5.2% Higher – Here’s What Happened

Shares of Piedmont Office Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:PDM) traded up 5.2% during trading on Tuesday . The company traded as high as $10.79 and last traded at $10.79. 232,075 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 73% from the average session volume of 860,263 shares. The stock had previously closed at $10.26.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts have commented on PDM shares. StockNews.com upgraded Piedmont Office Realty Trust from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 23rd. Truist Financial reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $11.00 price objective (up from $10.00) on shares of Piedmont Office Realty Trust in a research note on Wednesday, August 14th.

Piedmont Office Realty Trust Stock Performance

The company has a current ratio of 2.40, a quick ratio of 2.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $9.54 and its 200 day simple moving average is $8.07. The company has a market cap of $1.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -17.49 and a beta of 1.22.

Piedmont Office Realty Trust (NYSE:PDM) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The real estate investment trust reported ($0.08) EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.37 by ($0.45). The company had revenue of $143.26 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $141.25 million. Piedmont Office Realty Trust had a negative net margin of 14.24% and a negative return on equity of 4.84%. As a group, analysts anticipate that Piedmont Office Realty Trust, Inc. will post 1.5 earnings per share for the current year.

Piedmont Office Realty Trust Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 20th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 23rd were given a dividend of $0.125 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 23rd. This represents a $0.50 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.72%. Piedmont Office Realty Trust’s payout ratio is -81.97%.

Institutional Trading of Piedmont Office Realty Trust

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Blue Trust Inc. raised its position in shares of Piedmont Office Realty Trust by 38.3% during the 2nd quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 4,654 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $33,000 after buying an additional 1,288 shares during the period. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its position in shares of Piedmont Office Realty Trust by 2.9% during the 2nd quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 46,090 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $334,000 after purchasing an additional 1,311 shares during the last quarter. CWM LLC increased its position in shares of Piedmont Office Realty Trust by 15.1% during the 3rd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 12,772 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $129,000 after purchasing an additional 1,678 shares during the last quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its position in Piedmont Office Realty Trust by 8.5% in the first quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 22,203 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $156,000 after buying an additional 1,748 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Scharf Investments LLC boosted its stake in Piedmont Office Realty Trust by 18.8% during the first quarter. Scharf Investments LLC now owns 15,658 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $110,000 after buying an additional 2,475 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 84.48% of the company’s stock.

About Piedmont Office Realty Trust

Piedmont Office Realty Trust, Inc (also referred to herein as "Piedmont" or the "Company") (NYSE: PDM) is an owner, manager, developer, redeveloper and operator of high-quality, Class A office properties located primarily in major U.S. Sunbelt markets. The Company is a fully-integrated, self-managed real estate investment trust ("REIT") with local management offices in each of its markets and is investment-grade rated by Standard & Poor's and Moody's.