AES (NYSE:AES) Shares Up 5.5% - Here's Why

Shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES - Get Free Report) rose 5.5% during trading on Monday . The stock traded as high as $15.64 and last traded at $15.52. Approximately 2,496,326 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 70% from the average daily volume of 8,261,875 shares. The stock had previously closed at $14.71.

Analyst Ratings Changes

AES has been the subject of several recent research reports. Barclays raised their price target on shares of AES from $22.00 to $23.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research report on Monday, October 21st. Evercore ISI raised shares of AES to a "strong-buy" rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group started coverage on shares of AES in a research report on Wednesday, September 11th. They issued a "buy" rating and a $20.00 price target for the company. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, six have assigned a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $22.57.

AES Trading Up 3.5 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.63, a current ratio of 0.97 and a quick ratio of 0.91. The company has a market capitalization of $10.83 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.58 and a beta of 1.10. The business's 50 day simple moving average is $17.85 and its 200 day simple moving average is $18.30.

AES (NYSE:AES - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, October 31st. The utilities provider reported $0.71 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.60 by $0.11. The company had revenue of $3.29 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.46 billion. AES had a net margin of 8.34% and a return on equity of 28.95%. AES's quarterly revenue was down 4.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.60 earnings per share. Research analysts anticipate that The AES Co. will post 1.91 EPS for the current year.

AES Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 1st will be issued a $0.1725 dividend. This represents a $0.69 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.53%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 1st. AES's payout ratio is 47.92%.

Institutional Trading of AES

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in AES. Capital International Investors boosted its holdings in shares of AES by 11.4% in the first quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 77,641,395 shares of the utilities provider's stock valued at $1,392,110,000 after acquiring an additional 7,969,594 shares in the last quarter. M&G Plc purchased a new stake in AES during the first quarter worth about $123,272,000. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in AES by 2.2% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 89,725,232 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $1,608,773,000 after buying an additional 1,929,523 shares in the last quarter. Zurich Insurance Group Ltd FI purchased a new stake in AES during the second quarter worth about $30,746,000. Finally, Zimmer Partners LP boosted its holdings in AES by 482.8% during the first quarter. Zimmer Partners LP now owns 1,865,000 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $33,439,000 after buying an additional 1,545,000 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 93.13% of the company's stock.

AES Company Profile

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market.