TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) Shares Acquired by Maryland State Retirement & Pension System

Maryland State Retirement & Pension System lifted its holdings in shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 13.4% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 85,648 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after buying an additional 10,141 shares during the period. Maryland State Retirement & Pension System’s holdings in TELUS were worth $1,297,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in TU. CWM LLC raised its holdings in TELUS by 104.3% during the fourth quarter. CWM LLC now owns 3,891 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $69,000 after purchasing an additional 1,986 shares in the last quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. raised its holdings in TELUS by 21.9% during the fourth quarter. Russell Investments Group Ltd. now owns 544,463 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $9,736,000 after purchasing an additional 97,795 shares in the last quarter. Kestra Private Wealth Services LLC raised its holdings in TELUS by 1.6% during the fourth quarter. Kestra Private Wealth Services LLC now owns 91,468 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $1,627,000 after purchasing an additional 1,418 shares in the last quarter. Natixis Advisors L.P. raised its holdings in TELUS by 15.4% during the fourth quarter. Natixis Advisors L.P. now owns 96,631 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $1,719,000 after purchasing an additional 12,890 shares in the last quarter. Finally, M&T Bank Corp raised its holdings in TELUS by 14.9% during the fourth quarter. M&T Bank Corp now owns 29,732 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $529,000 after purchasing an additional 3,860 shares in the last quarter. 49.40% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research analysts have issued reports on TU shares. Canaccord Genuity Group cut shares of TELUS from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 6th. StockNews.com cut shares of TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Thursday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $27.33.

TELUS Price Performance

Shares of TU stock traded up $0.13 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $16.14. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 1,758,449 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,275,349. The business has a fifty day moving average of $15.81 and a 200-day moving average of $16.27. The stock has a market cap of $23.82 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.38, a P/E/G ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 0.73. TELUS Co. has a twelve month low of $14.63 and a twelve month high of $19.14. The company has a current ratio of 0.66, a quick ratio of 0.61 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.46.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 2nd. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.25 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.16 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $3.64 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.70 billion. TELUS had a net margin of 3.87% and a return on equity of 8.50%. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.14 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that TELUS Co. will post 0.73 EPS for the current year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, October 1st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, September 10th will be given a $0.284 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, September 10th. This is a positive change from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. This represents a $1.14 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 7.04%. TELUS’s dividend payout ratio is currently 287.18%.

About TELUS

TELUS Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides a range of telecommunications and information technology products and services in Canada. It operates through Technology Solutions and Digitally-Led Customer Experiences segments. The Technology Solutions segment offers a range of telecommunications products and services; network services; healthcare services; mobile technologies equipment; data services, such as internet protocol; television; hosting, managed information technology, and cloud-based services; software, data management, and data analytics-driven smart food-chain and consumer goods technologies; home and business security; healthcare software and technology solutions; and voice and other telecommunications services, as well as mobile and fixed voice and data telecommunications services and products.