Bank of Nova Scotia Trims Holdings in TELUS Corporation $TU

Bank of Nova Scotia reduced its stake in TELUS Corporation (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 25.1% during the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 19,771,788 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after selling 6,641,810 shares during the quarter. TELUS accounts for 0.6% of Bank of Nova Scotia’s portfolio, making the stock its 25th largest position. Bank of Nova Scotia’s holdings in TELUS were worth $317,461,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in TU. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. raised its position in TELUS by 196.2% in the first quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 11,836,479 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $169,735,000 after purchasing an additional 7,840,264 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of TELUS during the second quarter worth $77,455,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its position in shares of TELUS by 114.3% during the second quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 6,450,381 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $103,624,000 after buying an additional 3,439,940 shares during the period. Bessemer Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of TELUS by 1,981,964.7% in the second quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 3,428,972 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $54,969,000 after buying an additional 3,428,799 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Picton Mahoney Asset Management purchased a new stake in shares of TELUS in the 2nd quarter valued at $51,091,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 49.40% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently issued reports on TU. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reissued an “underweight” rating and set a $19.00 target price (down previously from $22.00) on shares of TELUS in a research note on Tuesday, November 18th. Canaccord Genuity Group upgraded shares of TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday. National Bankshares reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of TELUS in a research note on Thursday. Natl Bk Canada upgraded shares of TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, November 25th. Finally, Barclays cut their target price on shares of TELUS from $15.00 to $14.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, November 10th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have issued a Buy rating, five have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, TELUS has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $18.17.

TELUS Trading Up 1.2%

NYSE TU opened at $13.53 on Monday. TELUS Corporation has a 52 week low of $12.80 and a 52 week high of $16.74. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $14.53 and a two-hundred day moving average of $15.62. The company has a quick ratio of 0.71, a current ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.47. The stock has a market capitalization of $20.94 billion, a PE ratio of 24.59, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.18 and a beta of 0.67.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last released its quarterly earnings data on Friday, November 7th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.17 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.19 by ($0.02). The firm had revenue of $3.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.77 billion. TELUS had a return on equity of 8.76% and a net margin of 5.71%.TELUS’s revenue for the quarter was up .1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.28 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that TELUS Corporation will post 0.71 EPS for the current fiscal year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 2nd. Stockholders of record on Thursday, December 11th will be given a dividend of $0.4184 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, December 11th. This represents a $1.67 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 12.4%. This is an increase from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.30. TELUS’s payout ratio is currently 220.00%.

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.