Quadrature Capital Ltd Acquires New Stake in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL)

Quadrature Capital Ltd bought a new position in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor bought 60,209 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,749,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of HAL. Pacer Advisors Inc. raised its holdings in Halliburton by 17,317.6% in the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 13,631,188 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $460,462,000 after acquiring an additional 13,552,927 shares during the last quarter. LSV Asset Management raised its stake in shares of Halliburton by 24,954.1% in the second quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 2,730,900 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $92,250,000 after purchasing an additional 2,720,000 shares during the last quarter. Thompson Siegel & Walmsley LLC bought a new position in shares of Halliburton during the third quarter valued at $55,132,000. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its position in shares of Halliburton by 20.0% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 10,087,115 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $340,752,000 after buying an additional 1,681,620 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Thrivent Financial for Lutherans raised its position in Halliburton by 22.0% in the 3rd quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 5,520,383 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $160,367,000 after buying an additional 995,649 shares during the last quarter. 85.23% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Halliburton Price Performance

Shares of Halliburton stock opened at $28.78 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 2.21, a quick ratio of 1.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74. Halliburton has a 12 month low of $27.26 and a 12 month high of $41.56. The stock has a 50 day moving average of $29.87 and a 200 day moving average of $31.67. The firm has a market cap of $25.28 billion, a PE ratio of 10.03, a PEG ratio of 3.92 and a beta of 1.90.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The oilfield services company reported $0.73 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.75 by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $5.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $5.83 billion. Halliburton had a return on equity of 28.33% and a net margin of 11.04%. The company’s revenue was down 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.79 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Halliburton will post 3 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Halliburton Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 26th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, December 4th will be issued a $0.17 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, December 4th. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.36%. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 23.69%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

HAL has been the subject of several research reports. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $35.00 to $34.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, November 18th. Royal Bank of Canada lowered Halliburton from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and cut their price objective for the stock from $44.00 to $37.00 in a report on Friday, September 13th. UBS Group lowered their target price on Halliburton from $41.00 to $37.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, September 18th. Raymond James cut their price target on Halliburton from $41.00 to $37.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, November 8th. Finally, Dbs Bank started coverage on shares of Halliburton in a research note on Wednesday, September 18th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $45.00 price objective on the stock. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, sixteen have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $40.74.

Halliburton Company Profile

Halliburton Company provides products and services to the energy industry worldwide. It operates through two segments, Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. The Completion and Production segment offers production enhancement services that include stimulation and sand control services; cementing services, such as well bonding and casing, and casing equipment; and completion tools that offer downhole solutions and services, including well completion products and services, intelligent well completions, and service tools, as well as liner hanger, sand control, and multilateral systems.