Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) Price Target Lowered to $74.00 at Citigroup

Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) had its target price lowered by Citigroup from $80.00 to $74.00 in a research note published on Wednesday, Marketbeat Ratings reports. The brokerage currently has a buy rating on the stock.

BKR has been the subject of several other reports. Jefferies Financial Group restated a “buy” rating and set a $80.00 price objective on shares of Baker Hughes in a research report on Sunday, April 26th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price objective on Baker Hughes from $63.00 to $74.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, April 27th. Royal Bank Of Canada lifted their price objective on Baker Hughes from $68.00 to $71.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, April 27th. Argus lifted their price objective on Baker Hughes from $67.00 to $79.00 in a research report on Friday, May 1st. Finally, UBS Group lifted their price objective on Baker Hughes from $69.00 to $73.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, April 27th. Eighteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, three have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $69.14.

Baker Hughes Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ BKR opened at $64.27 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $63.76 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.53, a PEG ratio of 2.30 and a beta of 0.93. Baker Hughes has a 52 week low of $36.99 and a 52 week high of $70.41. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $63.86 and its 200 day moving average price is $57.18. The company has a current ratio of 2.13, a quick ratio of 1.77 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79.

Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, April 23rd. The company reported $0.58 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.49 by $0.09. Baker Hughes had a net margin of 11.17% and a return on equity of 14.17%. The firm had revenue of $6.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $6.71 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.51 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 2.5% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts forecast that Baker Hughes will post 2.31 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Baker Hughes Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, May 5th were issued a $0.23 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, May 5th. This represents a $0.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.4%. Baker Hughes’s payout ratio is 29.39%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Baker Hughes

In other news, CAO Rebecca L. Charlton sold 5,088 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $64.22, for a total transaction of $326,751.36. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer directly owned 15,997 shares in the company, valued at $1,027,327.34. This represents a 24.13% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, insider Maria Georgia Magno sold 5,063 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $59.04, for a total transaction of $298,919.52. Following the sale, the insider directly owned 15,555 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $918,367.20. This trade represents a 24.56% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. In the last three months, insiders sold 282,745 shares of company stock worth $16,651,472. Insiders own 0.19% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Baker Hughes

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Parallel Advisors LLC boosted its position in Baker Hughes by 15.2% in the 1st quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 13,421 shares of the company’s stock valued at $819,000 after buying an additional 1,772 shares during the last quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC boosted its position in Baker Hughes by 54.9% in the 1st quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 59,390 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,626,000 after buying an additional 21,047 shares during the last quarter. Groupama Asset Managment boosted its position in Baker Hughes by 0.6% in the 1st quarter. Groupama Asset Managment now owns 1,932,305 shares of the company’s stock valued at $117,967,000 after buying an additional 11,297 shares during the last quarter. Segall Bryant & Hamill LLC purchased a new position in Baker Hughes in the 1st quarter valued at about $356,000. Finally, BankChampaign National Association purchased a new position in Baker Hughes in the 1st quarter valued at about $989,000. 92.06% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Baker Hughes Company Profile

Baker Hughes is an energy technology company that provides a broad portfolio of products, services and digital solutions for the oil and gas and industrial markets. Its offerings span oilfield services and equipment — including drilling, evaluation, completion and production technologies — as well as turbomachinery, compressors and related process equipment used in midstream and downstream operations. The company also supplies aftermarket services, field support and integrated solutions designed to improve asset performance and uptime across the energy value chain.

The firm’s roots trace back to the merger of Baker International and Hughes Tool Company, and more recently it combined with GE’s oil and gas business in 2017 to form Baker Hughes, a GE company (BHGE); subsequent changes in ownership restored Baker Hughes as an independent publicly traded company.