Hancock Whitney’s (HWC) “Overweight” Rating Reiterated at Stephens

Stephens reiterated their overweight rating on shares of Hancock Whitney (NASDAQ:HWC) in a report published on Thursday,Benzinga reports. Stephens currently has a $68.00 price target on the stock.

HWC has been the topic of a number of other reports. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their target price on Hancock Whitney from $60.00 to $70.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 4th. DA Davidson lifted their price target on Hancock Whitney from $62.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 16th. Raymond James raised shares of Hancock Whitney from a “moderate buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Truist Financial dropped their target price on shares of Hancock Whitney from $57.00 to $56.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, September 20th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, six have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Hancock Whitney has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $60.00.

Hancock Whitney Stock Up 2.3 %

HWC opened at $55.27 on Thursday. Hancock Whitney has a 1 year low of $41.19 and a 1 year high of $62.40. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $56.89 and a 200 day moving average price of $52.74. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.06, a quick ratio of 0.81 and a current ratio of 0.82. The company has a market cap of $4.76 billion, a PE ratio of 12.39 and a beta of 1.27.

Hancock Whitney (NASDAQ:HWC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 15th. The company reported $1.33 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.31 by $0.02. Hancock Whitney had a return on equity of 11.47% and a net margin of 19.30%. The firm had revenue of $525.37 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $363.54 million. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.12 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Hancock Whitney will post 5.19 earnings per share for the current year.

Hancock Whitney Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 16th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, December 5th were given a $0.40 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, December 5th. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.89%. Hancock Whitney’s dividend payout ratio is currently 35.87%.

Insider Activity at Hancock Whitney

In other news, Director Carleton Richard Wilkins sold 800 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.95, for a total value of $40,760.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 15,900 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $810,105. This represents a 4.79 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO John M. Hairston sold 18,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, November 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $59.44, for a total value of $1,069,920.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 254,026 shares in the company, valued at $15,099,305.44. This trade represents a 6.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 27,994 shares of company stock worth $1,593,710. 1.10% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of Hancock Whitney

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its stake in Hancock Whitney by 21.1% in the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 551,636 shares of the company’s stock valued at $28,227,000 after acquiring an additional 96,092 shares during the last quarter. Sanctuary Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 15.8% during the third quarter. Sanctuary Advisors LLC now owns 20,131 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,030,000 after purchasing an additional 2,741 shares during the period. Second Line Capital LLC bought a new stake in Hancock Whitney in the third quarter valued at about $426,000. TD Private Client Wealth LLC lifted its stake in Hancock Whitney by 30.7% in the third quarter. TD Private Client Wealth LLC now owns 2,941 shares of the company’s stock valued at $150,000 after buying an additional 691 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Hancock Whitney by 1.4% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,149,648 shares of the company’s stock valued at $110,016,000 after acquiring an additional 30,239 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 81.22% of the company’s stock.

About Hancock Whitney

Hancock Whitney Corporation operates as the financial holding company for Hancock Whitney Bank that provides traditional and online banking services to commercial, small business, and retail customers. It offers various transaction and savings deposit products consisting of brokered deposits, time deposits, and money market accounts; treasury management services, secured and unsecured loan products including revolving credit facilities, and letters of credit and similar financial guarantees; and trust and investment management services to retirement plans, corporations, and individuals, and investment advisory and brokerage products.