Virtu Financial LLC Takes Position in The AES Co. (NYSE:AES)

Virtu Financial LLC bought a new position in shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor bought 36,791 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $473,000.

Several other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Millburn Ridgefield Corp acquired a new position in shares of AES during the 3rd quarter valued at about $28,000. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. boosted its position in AES by 190.3% during the fourth quarter. SRS Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 2,412 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $31,000 after purchasing an additional 1,581 shares during the period. WR Wealth Planners LLC raised its position in shares of AES by 93.3% in the fourth quarter. WR Wealth Planners LLC now owns 2,837 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $37,000 after purchasing an additional 1,369 shares during the period. Brooklyn Investment Group acquired a new stake in shares of AES in the third quarter worth $63,000. Finally, AlphaQuest LLC boosted its holdings in shares of AES by 18,047.1% during the 4th quarter. AlphaQuest LLC now owns 6,170 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $79,000 after buying an additional 6,136 shares during the period. 93.13% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have weighed in on AES. Barclays cut their target price on shares of AES from $17.00 to $12.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 27th. HSBC started coverage on AES in a research note on Friday, December 13th. They set a “buy” rating and a $17.00 target price for the company. Hsbc Global Res raised AES to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, December 13th. Seaport Res Ptn cut AES from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Monday, March 3rd. Finally, Bank of America raised shares of AES from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $11.00 to $13.00 in a research report on Tuesday, March 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $17.56.

AES Trading Down 1.6 %

Shares of AES stock opened at $12.67 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 0.85 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.21. The company has a market capitalization of $9.02 billion, a P/E ratio of 8.80, a P/E/G ratio of 0.82 and a beta of 0.94. The AES Co. has a 12-month low of $9.88 and a 12-month high of $22.21. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $11.32 and a 200 day moving average price of $13.90.

AES (NYSE:AES) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 28th. The utilities provider reported $0.54 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.34 by $0.20. AES had a net margin of 8.34% and a return on equity of 27.30%. The business had revenue of $2.96 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.07 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.73 EPS. Research analysts forecast that The AES Co. will post 1.93 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

AES Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, May 1st will be given a $0.176 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 1st. This represents a $0.70 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 5.55%. AES’s payout ratio is 29.54%.

AES Profile

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.