Verition Fund Management LLC Has $14.05 Million Stock Holdings in CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP)

Verition Fund Management LLC cut its position in shares of CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP - Free Report) by 29.4% in the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 477,418 shares of the utilities provider's stock after selling 198,556 shares during the quarter. Verition Fund Management LLC owned 0.07% of CenterPoint Energy worth $14,046,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 185.7% during the second quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 235,223 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $7,287,000 after buying an additional 152,878 shares in the last quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. grew its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 18.7% during the second quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 78,838 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $2,442,000 after buying an additional 12,422 shares in the last quarter. Bank of Montreal Can grew its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 13.4% during the second quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 1,052,237 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $32,630,000 after buying an additional 124,529 shares in the last quarter. Swiss National Bank grew its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 1.3% during the third quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 1,898,800 shares of the utilities provider's stock worth $55,863,000 after buying an additional 24,400 shares in the last quarter. Finally, DRW Securities LLC bought a new position in shares of CenterPoint Energy during the third quarter worth about $908,000. 91.77% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently commented on CNP. Scotiabank increased their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $28.00 to $30.00 and gave the company a "sector perform" rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Bank of America began coverage on CenterPoint Energy in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. They set a "neutral" rating and a $29.00 price target for the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut CenterPoint Energy from an "overweight" rating to a "neutral" rating and reduced their price target for the company from $32.00 to $29.00 in a research report on Friday, August 2nd. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $32.00 to $31.00 and set an "equal weight" rating for the company in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com cut CenterPoint Energy from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $30.00.

CenterPoint Energy Stock Performance

Shares of CNP traded down $0.04 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $32.62. The company's stock had a trading volume of 1,847,083 shares, compared to its average volume of 5,332,857. The stock has a market cap of $21.26 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.60, a PEG ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 0.92. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $30.14 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $29.27. The company has a current ratio of 1.11, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.87. CenterPoint Energy, Inc. has a 1-year low of $25.41 and a 1-year high of $32.86.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The utilities provider reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.31. The business had revenue of $1.86 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.88 billion. CenterPoint Energy had a return on equity of 9.73% and a net margin of 11.25%. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.40 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that CenterPoint Energy, Inc. will post 1.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

CenterPoint Energy Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, December 12th. Investors of record on Thursday, November 21st will be paid a $0.21 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, November 21st. This is an increase from CenterPoint Energy's previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. This represents a $0.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.58%. CenterPoint Energy's payout ratio is 55.63%.

CenterPoint Energy Company Profile

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.