Nicholas Hoffman & Company LLC. Sells 744 Shares of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Nicholas Hoffman & Company LLC. reduced its stake in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 1.3% during the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 56,639 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after selling 744 shares during the quarter. Nicholas Hoffman & Company LLC.’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $2,544,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in VZ. Gateway Investment Advisers LLC lifted its position in Verizon Communications by 15.4% during the 2nd quarter. Gateway Investment Advisers LLC now owns 283,160 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $11,678,000 after buying an additional 37,732 shares in the last quarter. Cyndeo Wealth Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 9.7% in the third quarter. Cyndeo Wealth Partners LLC now owns 202,521 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $9,095,000 after buying an additional 17,855 shares in the last quarter. Bleakley Financial Group LLC increased its holdings in Verizon Communications by 3.0% during the third quarter. Bleakley Financial Group LLC now owns 102,245 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $4,592,000 after buying an additional 2,953 shares during the last quarter. Meyer Handelman Co. raised its position in Verizon Communications by 5.9% during the second quarter. Meyer Handelman Co. now owns 973,547 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $40,149,000 after acquiring an additional 53,929 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Strategic Wealth Partners Ltd. lifted its stake in Verizon Communications by 164.4% in the third quarter. Strategic Wealth Partners Ltd. now owns 94,339 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $4,237,000 after acquiring an additional 58,657 shares during the last quarter. 62.06% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on VZ shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their target price on shares of Verizon Communications from $46.00 to $45.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Tigress Financial upped their price objective on Verizon Communications from $52.00 to $55.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 1st. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their target price on Verizon Communications from $42.00 to $46.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Monday, September 23rd. Scotiabank increased their price target on Verizon Communications from $46.50 to $47.25 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Finally, Bank of America upped their price target on shares of Verizon Communications from $41.00 to $45.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. Nine analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $46.37.

Verizon Communications Stock Down 0.7 %

NYSE VZ opened at $41.33 on Wednesday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $43.13 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $41.32. The stock has a market capitalization of $173.97 billion, a PE ratio of 15.42, a PEG ratio of 4.02 and a beta of 0.42. Verizon Communications Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $33.84 and a fifty-two week high of $45.36. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.29, a current ratio of 0.63 and a quick ratio of 0.60.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The cell phone carrier reported $1.19 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.18 by $0.01. Verizon Communications had a return on equity of 20.10% and a net margin of 8.38%. The business had revenue of $33.30 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $33.42 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $1.22 EPS. Verizon Communications’s revenue for the quarter was up .9% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts expect that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.58 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Verizon Communications Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th will be issued a dividend of $0.678 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, October 10th. This is a positive change from Verizon Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.67. This represents a $2.71 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 6.56%. Verizon Communications’s payout ratio is 101.12%.

Verizon Communications Company Profile

Verizon Communications Inc, through its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of communications, technology, information, and entertainment products and services to consumers, businesses, and governmental entities worldwide. It operates in two segments, Verizon Consumer Group (Consumer) and Verizon Business Group (Business).