JPMorgan Chase & Co. Reduces Position in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

JPMorgan Chase & Co. trimmed its position in shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU - Free Report) TSE: T by 8.0% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,355,620 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock after selling 378,986 shares during the quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. owned approximately 0.29% of TELUS worth $73,087,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. National Bank of Canada FI lifted its position in TELUS by 24.2% during the 3rd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 26,160,789 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock valued at $438,922,000 after acquiring an additional 5,094,269 shares during the period. 1832 Asset Management L.P. lifted its holdings in shares of TELUS by 6.6% during the second quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. now owns 38,193,733 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock valued at $578,253,000 after purchasing an additional 2,365,753 shares during the last quarter. Fiera Capital Corp boosted its position in shares of TELUS by 9.9% in the 2nd quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 16,670,713 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock worth $252,468,000 after purchasing an additional 1,501,742 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in shares of TELUS by 192.0% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 1,326,632 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock worth $22,257,000 after buying an additional 872,235 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Toronto Dominion Bank increased its position in TELUS by 5.4% during the 2nd quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 12,472,610 shares of the Wireless communications provider's stock valued at $188,835,000 after buying an additional 636,845 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 49.40% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have issued reports on TU. National Bank Financial cut shares of TELUS from an "outperform" rating to a "sector perform" rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Morgan Stanley initiated coverage on shares of TELUS in a research report on Monday, December 16th. They set an "equal weight" rating for the company. Scotiabank upgraded TELUS from a "sector perform" rating to a "sector outperform" rating in a research note on Monday, October 28th. Finally, StockNews.com cut TELUS from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research note on Thursday, November 21st. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating and two have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $26.00.

TELUS Price Performance

Shares of TELUS stock traded up $0.15 on Friday, hitting $13.78. 2,830,010 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,993,305. TELUS Co. has a 52 week low of $13.24 and a 52 week high of $18.55. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $14.98 and a 200 day simple moving average of $15.71. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50, a quick ratio of 0.63 and a current ratio of 0.69. The stock has a market capitalization of $20.67 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.32, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.10 and a beta of 0.73.

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

TELUS Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, January 2nd. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, December 11th were given a dividend of $0.297 per share. This represents a $1.19 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 8.62%. This is a boost from TELUS's previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, December 11th. TELUS's dividend payout ratio is currently 253.19%.

About TELUS

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.