Janney Montgomery Scott LLC Has $2.19 Million Stock Position in CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP)

Janney Montgomery Scott LLC reduced its position in CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP - Free Report) by 18.6% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 74,434 shares of the utilities provider's stock after selling 16,977 shares during the period. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC's holdings in CenterPoint Energy were worth $2,190,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 25.7% in the 3rd quarter. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 2,047 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $60,000 after purchasing an additional 418 shares in the last quarter. Pitcairn Co. raised its position in CenterPoint Energy by 2.3% in the 1st quarter. Pitcairn Co. now owns 19,544 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $557,000 after purchasing an additional 434 shares during the period. V Square Quantitative Management LLC raised its position in CenterPoint Energy by 2.4% in the 2nd quarter. V Square Quantitative Management LLC now owns 19,650 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $609,000 after purchasing an additional 462 shares during the period. US Bancorp DE raised its position in CenterPoint Energy by 0.8% in the 3rd quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 60,511 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $1,780,000 after purchasing an additional 472 shares during the period. Finally, Nisa Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 0.3% during the second quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC now owns 176,111 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $5,456,000 after acquiring an additional 492 shares during the period. 91.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have recently issued reports on CNP. Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $30.00 to $32.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 25th. Bank of America began coverage on shares of CenterPoint Energy in a research note on Thursday, September 12th. They issued a "neutral" rating and a $29.00 target price for the company. StockNews.com downgraded shares of CenterPoint Energy from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. BMO Capital Markets reissued a "market perform" rating and set a $28.00 target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy in a report on Monday, August 26th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut shares of CenterPoint Energy from an "overweight" rating to a "neutral" rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $32.00 to $29.00 in a report on Friday, August 2nd. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have given a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, CenterPoint Energy presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $30.09.

CenterPoint Energy Trading Down 0.1 %

CNP traded down $0.03 during trading on Wednesday, hitting $30.41. 6,126,860 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 5,380,724. The company has a current ratio of 1.11, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.87. CenterPoint Energy, Inc. has a 1 year low of $25.41 and a 1 year high of $31.57. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $29.20 and a 200 day moving average price of $29.07. The firm has a market cap of $19.82 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.14, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.64 and a beta of 0.92.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The utilities provider reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.31. The firm had revenue of $1.86 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $1.88 billion. CenterPoint Energy had a net margin of 11.25% and a return on equity of 9.73%. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.40 earnings per share. As a group, analysts expect that CenterPoint Energy, Inc. will post 1.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

CenterPoint Energy Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 21st will be issued a $0.21 dividend. This represents a $0.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.76%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, November 21st. This is a boost from CenterPoint Energy's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. CenterPoint Energy's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 55.63%.

About CenterPoint Energy

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.