Virtus Investment Advisers Inc. Sells 28,550 Shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES)

Virtus Investment Advisers Inc. trimmed its position in shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES) by 75.7% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 9,150 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after selling 28,550 shares during the period. Virtus Investment Advisers Inc.’s holdings in AES were worth $184,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Weiss Asset Management LP purchased a new stake in shares of AES in the third quarter worth approximately $1,019,000. Two Sigma Advisers LP grew its position in AES by 30.3% in the 3rd quarter. Two Sigma Advisers LP now owns 3,838,500 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $77,000,000 after acquiring an additional 892,500 shares during the last quarter. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd purchased a new stake in AES in the third quarter worth $3,368,000. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of AES by 18.2% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 38,651,752 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $775,354,000 after purchasing an additional 5,960,546 shares during the period. Finally, Stifel Financial Corp grew its holdings in shares of AES by 3.0% in the third quarter. Stifel Financial Corp now owns 288,647 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $5,790,000 after purchasing an additional 8,294 shares during the last quarter. 93.13% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

AES has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Evercore ISI upgraded shares of AES to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. Susquehanna lowered their price target on AES from $24.00 to $21.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. Mizuho reduced their price objective on AES from $24.00 to $16.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, November 21st. Bank of America started coverage on AES in a report on Monday, November 25th. They issued an “underperform” rating and a $11.00 target price for the company. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group assumed coverage on AES in a research note on Wednesday, September 11th. They set a “buy” rating and a $20.00 price target on the stock. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $20.22.

AES Stock Down 1.1 %

NYSE:AES opened at $13.29 on Friday. The AES Co. has a fifty-two week low of $12.53 and a fifty-two week high of $22.21. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $15.74 and its 200-day simple moving average is $17.46. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.21, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.85. The stock has a market capitalization of $9.45 billion, a P/E ratio of 9.23, a P/E/G ratio of 0.68 and a beta of 1.01.

AES (NYSE:AES) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The utilities provider reported $0.71 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.11. The business had revenue of $3.29 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.46 billion. AES had a return on equity of 27.30% and a net margin of 8.34%. The company’s revenue was down 4.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.60 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts anticipate that The AES Co. will post 1.95 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

AES Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 1st were paid a dividend of $0.1725 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, November 1st. This represents a $0.69 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.19%. AES’s payout ratio is currently 47.92%.

About AES

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market.