Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

Shares of Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) have been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the eight analysts that are presently covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, five have issued a hold recommendation and two have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year price objective among analysts that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is C$58.90.

Several research firms have recently weighed in on FTS. BMO Capital Markets upped their price objective on Fortis from C$58.50 to C$59.00 in a research report on Thursday, August 1st. Scotiabank upped their price target on Fortis from C$56.00 to C$63.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Fortis from C$56.00 to C$59.00 in a report on Wednesday, May 8th. CIBC increased their target price on shares of Fortis from C$57.00 to C$59.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 1st. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of Fortis from C$52.00 to C$53.00 in a research report on Thursday, July 25th.

Fortis Stock Up 0.2 %

Fortis stock opened at C$59.49 on Friday. The company has a 50 day moving average of C$56.03 and a 200-day moving average of C$54.52. The company has a quick ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 128.59. Fortis has a twelve month low of C$49.82 and a twelve month high of C$60.37. The stock has a market capitalization of C$29.46 billion, a PE ratio of 18.65, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.80 and a beta of 0.22.

Fortis (TSE:FTS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 31st. The company reported C$0.67 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of C$0.65 by C$0.02. The business had revenue of C$2.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of C$2.71 billion. Fortis had a net margin of 14.35% and a return on equity of 7.44%. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Fortis will post 3.2312668 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Sunday, September 1st. Stockholders of record on Sunday, September 1st will be issued a $0.59 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, August 20th. This represents a $2.36 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.97%. Fortis’s payout ratio is 73.98%.

Insider Activity at Fortis

In other Fortis news, Senior Officer James Reid acquired 700 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 19th. The shares were purchased at an average price of C$52.37 per share, for a total transaction of C$36,659.00. 0.04% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

About Fortis

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.