Teck Resources (NYSE:TECK) Upgraded at Veritas

Veritas upgraded shares of Teck Resources (NYSE:TECK) (TSE:TECK) from a strong sell rating to a strong-buy rating in a research note issued to investors on Thursday,Zacks.com reports.

TECK has been the subject of several other research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on Teck Resources from $43.00 to $51.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, December 5th. Natl Bk Canada lowered shares of Teck Resources from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, December 5th. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of Teck Resources from a “sell (d+)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Friday, October 24th. Raymond James Financial lowered shares of Teck Resources from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Finally, Scotiabank restated a “sector perform” rating on shares of Teck Resources in a research report on Tuesday, November 25th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have issued a Buy rating and fourteen have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $55.71.

Teck Resources Trading Down 3.3%

Teck Resources stock opened at $50.57 on Thursday. Teck Resources has a 12-month low of $28.32 and a 12-month high of $52.42. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15, a current ratio of 2.78 and a quick ratio of 2.08. The stock has a market capitalization of $24.32 billion, a PE ratio of 28.41, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.55 and a beta of 0.79. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $45.19 and a 200-day simple moving average of $40.72.

Teck Resources (NYSE:TECK) (TSE:TECK) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, October 22nd. The basic materials company reported $0.55 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.39 by $0.16. Teck Resources had a return on equity of 4.14% and a net margin of 11.93%.The firm had revenue of $2.43 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.93 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.60 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 18.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Teck Resources will post 1.53 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Teck Resources Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, December 31st. Investors of record on Monday, December 15th were paid a $0.125 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 15th. This represents a $0.50 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.0%. This is a positive change from Teck Resources’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.09. Teck Resources’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 20.22%.

Institutional Trading of Teck Resources

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of TECK. Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Teck Resources by 36.1% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 16,879,229 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $740,604,000 after buying an additional 4,474,637 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Teck Resources during the 2nd quarter worth about $437,657,000. Boston Partners grew its stake in Teck Resources by 1.2% during the 2nd quarter. Boston Partners now owns 9,365,206 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $378,167,000 after acquiring an additional 113,431 shares in the last quarter. Mackenzie Financial Corp increased its holdings in shares of Teck Resources by 32.7% in the 2nd quarter. Mackenzie Financial Corp now owns 7,989,715 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $323,311,000 after purchasing an additional 1,969,286 shares during the period. Finally, Hancock Prospecting Pty Ltd lifted its position in shares of Teck Resources by 1.6% in the third quarter. Hancock Prospecting Pty Ltd now owns 7,820,949 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $343,261,000 after purchasing an additional 125,000 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 78.06% of the company’s stock.

Teck Resources Company Profile

Teck Resources Ltd. is a diversified natural resource company headquartered in Canada that explores for, develops and produces a portfolio of metallic and energy commodities. Its core businesses center on copper, steelmaking (metallurgical) coal and zinc, with related smelting and refining activities. Teck supplies raw materials and intermediate products to global steelmakers, metals markets and industrial customers, and operates integrated mining and processing facilities as well as earlier-stage exploration and development projects.

The company’s operations and projects are located across multiple geographies, with a significant presence in western Canada and North America and additional exploration and development activities in Latin America.