BP p.l.c. (NYSE:BP) Shares Sold by Paradigm Asset Management Co. LLC

Paradigm Asset Management Co. LLC cut its stake in BP p.l.c. (NYSE:BP) by 98.3% during the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 2,900 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock after selling 163,478 shares during the period. Paradigm Asset Management Co. LLC’s holdings in BP were worth $91,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC boosted its position in shares of BP by 2.6% during the 3rd quarter. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC now owns 646,102 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $20,281,000 after purchasing an additional 16,534 shares in the last quarter. Kornitzer Capital Management Inc. KS boosted its holdings in shares of BP by 5.4% in the third quarter. Kornitzer Capital Management Inc. KS now owns 454,980 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $14,282,000 after buying an additional 23,325 shares during the period. Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of BP by 3.4% in the second quarter. Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. now owns 429,773 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $15,515,000 after buying an additional 13,984 shares during the period. Gabelli Funds LLC boosted its holdings in shares of BP by 2.2% in the second quarter. Gabelli Funds LLC now owns 360,050 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $12,998,000 after buying an additional 7,850 shares during the period. Finally, Altrius Capital Management Inc lifted its position in shares of BP by 2.2% in the second quarter. Altrius Capital Management Inc now owns 212,800 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $7,682,000 after purchasing an additional 4,575 shares in the last quarter. 11.01% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts recently weighed in on the stock. BNP Paribas lowered shares of BP from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. StockNews.com upgraded BP from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 5th. Barclays upgraded BP to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 31st. Wolfe Research started coverage on shares of BP in a research report on Thursday, July 18th. They set an “outperform” rating and a $57.00 target price on the stock. Finally, UBS Group raised shares of BP to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, July 30th. Eleven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and four have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $42.73.

BP Price Performance

NYSE BP opened at $28.16 on Wednesday. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $31.34 and a 200 day simple moving average of $34.15. BP p.l.c. has a 52-week low of $28.03 and a 52-week high of $40.40. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.66, a quick ratio of 0.94 and a current ratio of 1.22. The stock has a market cap of $76.39 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.64, a PEG ratio of 1.97 and a beta of 0.65.

BP (NYSE:BP) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The oil and gas exploration company reported $0.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.78 by $0.05. BP had a return on equity of 12.91% and a net margin of 1.36%. The business had revenue of $47.25 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $52.05 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $1.15 EPS. BP’s revenue for the quarter was down 11.3% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts anticipate that BP p.l.c. will post 3.68 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

BP Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 20th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 8th will be issued a $0.48 dividend. This represents a $1.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 6.82%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 8th. BP’s payout ratio is presently 200.00%.

BP Profile

BP p.l.c. provides carbon products and services. The company operates through Gas & Low Carbon Energy, Oil Production & Operations, and Customers & Products segments. It engages in the production of natural gas, and integrated gas and power; trading of gas; operation of onshore and offshore wind power, as well as hydrogen and carbon capture and storage facilities; trading and marketing of renewable and non-renewable power; and production of crude oil.