Harvest Portfolios Group Inc. Increases Position in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Harvest Portfolios Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 3.3% in the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 579,713 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after acquiring an additional 18,346 shares during the quarter. Harvest Portfolios Group Inc.’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $26,035,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Benchmark Financial Wealth Advisors LLC grew its holdings in Verizon Communications by 15.1% during the third quarter. Benchmark Financial Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 7,593 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $341,000 after purchasing an additional 998 shares during the period. Radnor Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in Verizon Communications by 19.0% during the 3rd quarter. Radnor Capital Management LLC now owns 67,148 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $3,016,000 after buying an additional 10,734 shares in the last quarter. Leslie Global Wealth LLC increased its holdings in Verizon Communications by 78.4% during the 3rd quarter. Leslie Global Wealth LLC now owns 8,992 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $404,000 after acquiring an additional 3,953 shares during the period. HF Advisory Group LLC increased its holdings in shares of Verizon Communications by 5.1% in the third quarter. HF Advisory Group LLC now owns 60,090 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $2,699,000 after purchasing an additional 2,938 shares during the period. Finally, Crescent Grove Advisors LLC raised its holdings in shares of Verizon Communications by 124.1% in the 3rd quarter. Crescent Grove Advisors LLC now owns 37,517 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $1,685,000 after acquiring an additional 20,778 shares in the last quarter. 62.06% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

VZ has been the subject of a number of research reports. KeyCorp cut shares of Verizon Communications from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 24th. Tigress Financial raised their price objective on Verizon Communications from $52.00 to $55.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 1st. Bank of America upped their target price on Verizon Communications from $41.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on Verizon Communications from $42.00 to $46.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Monday, September 23rd. Finally, Scotiabank lifted their target price on shares of Verizon Communications from $46.50 to $47.25 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, October 18th. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $46.37.

Verizon Communications Stock Performance

Verizon Communications stock opened at $41.47 on Wednesday. Verizon Communications Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $35.40 and a fifty-two week high of $45.36. The stock has a market cap of $174.57 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.78, a PEG ratio of 3.01 and a beta of 0.43. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $43.15 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $41.37. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a current ratio of 0.66.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 22nd. The cell phone carrier reported $1.19 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.18 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $33.30 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $33.42 billion. Verizon Communications had a net margin of 7.30% and a return on equity of 20.05%. Verizon Communications’s quarterly revenue was up .9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.22 EPS. As a group, analysts expect that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.61 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Verizon Communications Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Stockholders of record on Thursday, October 10th were paid a $0.678 dividend. This is a boost from Verizon Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.67. This represents a $2.71 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 6.54%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. Verizon Communications’s dividend payout ratio is currently 116.81%.

About Verizon Communications

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).