Quantbot Technologies LP Sells 58,421 Shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

Quantbot Technologies LP lessened its position in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU - Free Report) TSE: T by 75.3% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 19,145 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock after selling 58,421 shares during the quarter. Quantbot Technologies LP's holdings in TELUS were worth $321,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. TD Asset Management Inc grew its holdings in TELUS by 3.0% in the second quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 41,711,861 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock worth $631,310,000 after purchasing an additional 1,208,720 shares during the period. 1832 Asset Management L.P. grew its stake in shares of TELUS by 6.6% in the 2nd quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. now owns 38,193,733 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock worth $578,253,000 after buying an additional 2,365,753 shares during the last quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc increased its position in TELUS by 1.8% during the 2nd quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 22,404,617 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock valued at $338,953,000 after buying an additional 387,686 shares in the last quarter. Fiera Capital Corp raised its stake in TELUS by 1.3% during the third quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 16,882,528 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock valued at $283,854,000 after buying an additional 211,815 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Toronto Dominion Bank boosted its holdings in TELUS by 5.4% in the second quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 12,472,610 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock worth $188,835,000 after acquiring an additional 636,845 shares in the last quarter. 49.40% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have issued reports on TU shares. Scotiabank upgraded shares of TELUS from a "sector perform" rating to a "sector outperform" rating in a research note on Monday, October 28th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of TELUS from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research report on Thursday, November 21st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $26.00.

TELUS Price Performance

Shares of TU traded up $0.07 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $15.76. 3,193,551 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,330,373. The stock has a market cap of $23.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.53, a PEG ratio of 2.26 and a beta of 0.73. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $15.86 and a 200-day moving average of $16.01. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50, a quick ratio of 0.63 and a current ratio of 0.69. TELUS Co. has a 52 week low of $14.63 and a 52 week high of $19.14.

TELUS (NYSE:TU - Get Free Report) TSE: T last posted its earnings results on Friday, November 8th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.28 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.17 by $0.11. TELUS had a return on equity of 8.80% and a net margin of 4.56%. The firm had revenue of $5.10 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.69 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.19 EPS. The company's quarterly revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts forecast that TELUS Co. will post 0.73 EPS for the current fiscal year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, December 11th will be issued a dividend of $0.297 per share. This represents a $1.19 annualized dividend and a yield of 7.54%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, December 11th. This is a positive change from TELUS's previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. TELUS's dividend payout ratio is presently 253.19%.

TELUS Profile

TELUS Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides a range of telecommunications and information technology products and services in Canada. It operates through Technology Solutions and Digitally-Led Customer Experiences segments. The Technology Solutions segment offers a range of telecommunications products and services; network services; healthcare services; mobile technologies equipment; data services, such as internet protocol; television; hosting, managed information technology, and cloud-based services; software, data management, and data analytics-driven smart food-chain and consumer goods technologies; home and business security; healthcare software and technology solutions; and voice and other telecommunications services, as well as mobile and fixed voice and data telecommunications services and products.