Richard C. Young & CO. LTD. Decreases Stake in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS)

Richard C. Young & CO. LTD. cut its stake in shares of Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS - Free Report) by 40.2% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 164,508 shares of the utilities provider's stock after selling 110,519 shares during the quarter. Richard C. Young & CO. LTD.'s holdings in Fortis were worth $7,475,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in FTS. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP raised its stake in Fortis by 4.5% in the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 489,343 shares of the utilities provider's stock valued at $19,006,000 after buying an additional 21,059 shares in the last quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc raised its position in shares of Fortis by 4.2% during the 2nd quarter. CIBC Asset Management Inc now owns 3,938,001 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $152,955,000 after acquiring an additional 158,178 shares in the last quarter. Fiera Capital Corp lifted its stake in Fortis by 10.8% during the second quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 858,512 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $33,380,000 after purchasing an additional 83,858 shares during the last quarter. Intact Investment Management Inc. boosted its holdings in Fortis by 163.8% in the third quarter. Intact Investment Management Inc. now owns 227,700 shares of the utilities provider's stock valued at $10,347,000 after purchasing an additional 141,400 shares in the last quarter. Finally, DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale boosted its holdings in Fortis by 11.1% in the first quarter. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale now owns 300,509 shares of the utilities provider's stock valued at $11,803,000 after purchasing an additional 30,103 shares in the last quarter. 57.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Fortis Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE FTS traded down $0.13 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $44.04. 139,024 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 721,477. The stock has a market cap of $21.90 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.56, a PEG ratio of 4.04 and a beta of 0.47. Fortis Inc. has a 1 year low of $36.86 and a 1 year high of $46.06. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $44.41 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.18. The company has a current ratio of 0.69, a quick ratio of 0.58 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.26.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS - Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, November 5th. The utilities provider reported $0.85 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.59 by $0.26. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.03% and a net margin of 14.06%. The company had revenue of $2.03 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.01 billion. During the same period last year, the business posted $0.63 EPS. On average, research analysts forecast that Fortis Inc. will post 2.32 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Sunday, December 1st. Shareholders of record on Monday, November 18th will be given a dividend of $0.615 per share. This is a boost from Fortis's previous quarterly dividend of $0.43. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 18th. This represents a $2.46 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.59%. Fortis's payout ratio is presently 76.05%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Bank of America assumed coverage on shares of Fortis in a research report on Friday, September 20th. They set an "underperform" rating for the company. UBS Group raised shares of Fortis to a "strong sell" rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 10th. Raymond James lowered Fortis from an "outperform" rating to a "market perform" rating in a report on Wednesday, November 6th. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded Fortis from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a research report on Sunday, August 4th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and two have assigned a hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Fortis has a consensus rating of "Reduce".

About Fortis

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.