Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) Receives Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Brokerages

Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) has been given an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by the ten analysts that are covering the company, Marketbeat.com reports. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. The average twelve-month price objective among analysts that have covered the stock in the last year is C$79.32.

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Barclays cut their target price on Fortis from C$84.00 to C$83.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, May 8th. National Bank Financial boosted their target price on Fortis from C$75.00 to C$82.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Monday, June 1st. Raymond James Financial boosted their target price on Fortis from C$78.50 to C$80.50 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 28th. Finally, TD boosted their target price on Fortis from C$83.00 to C$84.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 7th.

Fortis Price Performance

FTS stock opened at C$79.33 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of C$40.39 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.01 and a beta of 0.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 145.23, a quick ratio of 0.36 and a current ratio of 0.49. Fortis has a 52-week low of C$63.54 and a 52-week high of C$81.10. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of C$77.58 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of C$75.58.

Fortis (TSE:FTS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 6th. The company reported C$0.99 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. The business had revenue of C$3.40 billion during the quarter. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.51% and a net margin of 14.75%. Research analysts expect that Fortis will post 3.3419913 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Fortis Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 1st were paid a $0.64 dividend. This represents a $2.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.2%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, May 15th. Fortis’s payout ratio is presently 74.04%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Fortis

In other news, insider James Reid sold 24,700 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, June 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of C$79.21, for a total value of C$1,956,487.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 31,283 shares in the company, valued at C$2,477,926.43. The trade was a 44.12% decrease in their position. 0.04% of the stock is owned by insiders.

About Fortis

Fortis owns and operates 10 utility transmission and distribution assets in Canada and the United States, serving more than 3.4 million electricity and gas customers. The company has smaller stakes in electricity generation and several Caribbean utilities. ITC operates electric transmission in seven U.S. states, with more than 16,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in operation serving a peak load in excess of 23 gigawatts.