NiSource (NYSE:NI) Research Coverage Started at Mizuho

Equities researchers at Mizuho started coverage on shares of NiSource (NYSE:NI) in a research note issued on Thursday, Marketbeat reports. The brokerage set an “outperform” rating and a $33.00 price target on the utilities provider’s stock. Mizuho’s target price would indicate a potential upside of 9.74% from the stock’s previous close.

NI has been the subject of a number of other research reports. BMO Capital Markets restated an “outperform” rating and set a $31.00 target price on shares of NiSource in a research report on Tuesday, June 18th. Evercore ISI upped their price target on shares of NiSource from $30.00 to $32.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 9th. Finally, Barclays upped their price target on shares of NiSource from $30.00 to $31.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 14th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $29.83.

NiSource Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:NI opened at $30.07 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.20, a quick ratio of 0.56 and a current ratio of 0.66. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $28.66 and a 200 day moving average price of $27.35. NiSource has a fifty-two week low of $22.86 and a fifty-two week high of $30.24. The firm has a market cap of $13.48 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.65, a P/E/G ratio of 2.88 and a beta of 0.50.

NiSource (NYSE:NI) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, May 8th. The utilities provider reported $0.85 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.83 by $0.02. NiSource had a net margin of 14.23% and a return on equity of 9.56%. The firm had revenue of $1.71 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.07 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $0.77 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that NiSource will post 1.72 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Melanie B. Berman sold 3,742 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $27.96, for a total value of $104,626.32. Following the sale, the senior vice president now owns 19,978 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $558,584.88. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Insiders own 0.13% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On NiSource

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in NI. Zimmer Partners LP increased its stake in NiSource by 146.2% in the 1st quarter. Zimmer Partners LP now owns 8,907,743 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $246,388,000 after buying an additional 5,290,322 shares during the period. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. increased its stake in NiSource by 123.6% in the 4th quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. now owns 5,593,854 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $148,517,000 after buying an additional 3,092,138 shares during the period. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. increased its stake in NiSource by 330.9% in the 1st quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 3,463,203 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $95,792,000 after buying an additional 2,659,551 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in NiSource in the 4th quarter worth about $70,090,000. Finally, HITE Hedge Asset Management LLC increased its stake in NiSource by 110.9% in the 4th quarter. HITE Hedge Asset Management LLC now owns 3,915,163 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $103,948,000 after buying an additional 2,058,646 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.64% of the company’s stock.

About NiSource

NiSource Inc, an energy holding company, operates as a regulated natural gas and electric utility company in the United States. It operates in two segments, Gas Distribution Operations and Electric Operations. The company distributes natural gas to approximately 3.3 million customers through approximately 55,000 miles of distribution main pipeline and the associated individual customer service lines; and 1,000 miles of transmission main pipeline in northern Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Kentucky, and Maryland.