Mengis Capital Management Inc. Has $2.34 Million Stock Position in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Mengis Capital Management Inc. lowered its stake in shares of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 5.9% during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 52,031 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after selling 3,242 shares during the quarter. Mengis Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $2,337,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Gateway Investment Advisers LLC increased its stake in shares of 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 purchasing an additional 37,732 shares during the last quarter. Cyndeo Wealth Partners LLC grew its holdings in Verizon Communications by 9.7% during the third quarter. Cyndeo Wealth Partners LLC now owns 202,521 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $9,095,000 after purchasing an additional 17,855 shares during the period. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC increased its position in Verizon Communications by 2.9% during the third quarter. Janney Montgomery Scott LLC now owns 2,058,443 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $92,445,000 after buying an additional 57,583 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its position in Verizon Communications by 2.7% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 4,954,357 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $222,500,000 after buying an additional 129,171 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Harvest Portfolios Group Inc. raised its stake in Verizon Communications by 3.3% in the third quarter. Harvest Portfolios Group Inc. now owns 579,713 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $26,035,000 after buying an additional 18,346 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 62.06% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

VZ has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. UBS Group boosted their target price on Verizon Communications from $43.00 to $44.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 23rd. Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $47.00 to $49.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 25th. Raymond James raised their target price on shares of Verizon Communications from $44.00 to $48.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 24th. TD Cowen upped their price target on shares of Verizon Communications from $48.00 to $51.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 23rd. Finally, Bank of America raised their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $41.00 to $45.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 26th. Nine research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Verizon Communications has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $46.37.

Verizon Communications Price Performance

Shares of NYSE VZ opened at $40.39 on Wednesday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $43.03 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $41.41. The stock has a market capitalization of $170.03 billion, a PE ratio of 17.41, a P/E/G ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 0.43. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32, a current ratio of 0.66 and a quick ratio of 0.62. Verizon Communications Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $35.41 and a fifty-two week high of $45.36.

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

Verizon Communications Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Investors of record on Thursday, October 10th were given a dividend of $0.678 per share. This is a positive change from Verizon Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.67. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, October 10th. This represents a $2.71 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 6.71%. Verizon Communications’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 116.81%.

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).