TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) Receives $26.00 Average PT from Analysts

TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) has been assigned an average rating of “Hold” from the five research firms that are presently covering the company, Marketbeat.com reports. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and one has issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 12-month price objective among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $26.00.

Several analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. Cormark downgraded shares of TELUS from a “moderate buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. National Bank Financial downgraded shares of TELUS from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Morgan Stanley assumed coverage on TELUS in a research report on Monday, December 16th. They set an “equal weight” rating on the stock. Finally, StockNews.com upgraded shares of TELUS from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, February 10th.

TELUS Stock Down 4.3 %

Shares of TU opened at $15.39 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $23.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.18 and a beta of 0.72. TELUS has a 1 year low of $13.24 and a 1 year high of $17.39. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.52, a current ratio of 0.68 and a quick ratio of 0.61. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $14.67 and its 200-day simple moving average is $15.36.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.18 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.16 by $0.02. TELUS had a return on equity of 9.07% and a net margin of 4.85%. The business had revenue of $3.85 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.64 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.10 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts expect that TELUS will post 0.71 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

TELUS Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 1st. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, March 11th will be paid a dividend of $0.2829 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, March 11th. This represents a $1.13 annualized dividend and a yield of 7.35%. TELUS’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 226.53%.

Institutional Trading of TELUS

Several large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Versant Capital Management Inc boosted its stake in TELUS by 195,100.0% during the fourth quarter. Versant Capital Management Inc now owns 1,952 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $26,000 after buying an additional 1,951 shares during the period. Avior Wealth Management LLC lifted its position in TELUS by 1,756.0% during the 4th quarter. Avior Wealth Management LLC now owns 4,807 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $65,000 after acquiring an additional 4,548 shares during the period. Optiver Holding B.V. purchased a new stake in shares of TELUS in the fourth quarter valued at about $120,000. Blueshift Asset Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of TELUS in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $142,000. Finally, Triasima Portfolio Management inc. purchased a new stake in TELUS during the fourth quarter worth about $146,000. 49.40% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About TELUS

TELUS Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides a range of telecommunications and information technology products and services in Canada. It operates through Technology Solutions and Digitally-Led Customer Experiences segments. The Technology Solutions segment offers a range of telecommunications products and services; network services; healthcare services; mobile technologies equipment; data services, such as internet protocol; television; hosting, managed information technology, and cloud-based services; software, data management, and data analytics-driven smart food-chain and consumer goods technologies; home and business security; healthcare software and technology solutions; and voice and other telecommunications services, as well as mobile and fixed voice and data telecommunications services and products.