Plains All American Pipeline Sees Unusually Large Options Volume (NYSE:PAA)

Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. (NYSE:PAA - Get Free Report) saw unusually large options trading activity on Tuesday. Stock investors bought 8,315 call options on the company. This is an increase of 40% compared to the average volume of 5,953 call options.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Plains All American Pipeline

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB purchased a new position in shares of Plains All American Pipeline in the 3rd quarter valued at about $27,000. Newbridge Financial Services Group Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Plains All American Pipeline in the 4th quarter valued at about $27,000. National Bank of Canada FI acquired a new stake in Plains All American Pipeline in the 4th quarter valued at about $27,000. Jones Financial Companies Lllp grew its stake in Plains All American Pipeline by 1,684.0% in the 4th quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp now owns 3,568 shares of the pipeline company's stock valued at $61,000 after acquiring an additional 3,368 shares during the last quarter. Finally, CoreFirst Bank & Trust acquired a new stake in Plains All American Pipeline in the 4th quarter valued at about $97,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 41.78% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have commented on PAA. Barclays lifted their target price on shares of Plains All American Pipeline from $18.00 to $19.00 and gave the stock an "underweight" rating in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed a "sector perform" rating and set a $19.00 target price on shares of Plains All American Pipeline in a research note on Friday, November 15th. Wells Fargo & Company downgraded shares of Plains All American Pipeline from an "overweight" rating to an "equal weight" rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $22.00 to $20.00 in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Scotiabank reduced their target price on shares of Plains All American Pipeline from $23.00 to $22.00 and set a "sector outperform" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday. Finally, Raymond James lifted their target price on shares of Plains All American Pipeline from $23.00 to $24.00 and gave the stock a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating, six have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $20.14.

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Plains All American Pipeline Stock Performance

NYSE:PAA traded up $0.35 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $19.35. 3,306,913 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,303,884. The firm has a market capitalization of $13.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.51 and a beta of 1.62. The company has a 50-day moving average of $19.53 and a 200 day moving average of $18.20. The company has a quick ratio of 0.92, a current ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.64. Plains All American Pipeline has a 1-year low of $16.21 and a 1-year high of $21.00.

Plains All American Pipeline Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 14th. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 31st were given a dividend of $0.38 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 31st. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 7.86%. This is an increase from Plains All American Pipeline's previous quarterly dividend of $0.32. Plains All American Pipeline's dividend payout ratio is presently 208.22%.

About Plains All American Pipeline

Plains All American Pipeline, L.P., through its subsidiaries, engages in the pipeline transportation, terminaling, storage, and gathering of crude oil and natural gas liquids (NGL) in the United States and Canada. The company operates through two segments, Crude Oil and NGL. The Crude Oil segment offers gathering and transporting crude oil through pipelines, gathering systems, trucks, and on barges or railcars.