Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL) Shares Bought by Blue Trust Inc.

Blue Trust Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Shell plc (NYSE:SHEL) by 28.4% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 39,810 shares of the energy company’s stock after buying an additional 8,795 shares during the period. Blue Trust Inc.’s holdings in Shell were worth $2,625,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. FMR LLC increased its stake in shares of Shell by 5.2% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 65,298,943 shares of the energy company’s stock worth $4,306,465,000 after acquiring an additional 3,255,347 shares during the period. Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its position in Shell by 2.1% during the 3rd quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 24,530,647 shares of the energy company’s stock worth $1,617,796,000 after purchasing an additional 507,311 shares during the period. Franklin Resources Inc. raised its stake in shares of Shell by 0.9% during the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 5,972,945 shares of the energy company’s stock valued at $408,430,000 after buying an additional 55,637 shares during the last quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. boosted its stake in shares of Shell by 8.7% in the third quarter. Mawer Investment Management Ltd. now owns 5,282,868 shares of the energy company’s stock worth $348,405,000 after buying an additional 422,329 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Holocene Advisors LP grew its holdings in Shell by 29.8% during the third quarter. Holocene Advisors LP now owns 3,773,617 shares of the energy company’s stock worth $248,870,000 after acquiring an additional 866,954 shares during the period. 28.60% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on the stock. Piper Sandler decreased their target price on shares of Shell from $82.00 to $72.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Citigroup raised Shell to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Barclays upgraded Shell to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Shell from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $66.50 to $79.80 in a report on Tuesday, January 7th. Finally, UBS Group upgraded shares of Shell from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and three have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Shell presently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $79.69.

Shell Trading Down 0.4 %

SHEL opened at $65.12 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.34, a current ratio of 1.40 and a quick ratio of 1.13. The company’s 50 day simple moving average is $64.21 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $67.50. The firm has a market capitalization of $199.11 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 5.89 and a beta of 0.55. Shell plc has a 1-year low of $60.15 and a 1-year high of $74.61.

Shell (NYSE:SHEL) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The energy company reported $1.92 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.72 by $0.20. Shell had a return on equity of 14.54% and a net margin of 5.17%. The company had revenue of $72.46 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $84.58 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $1.86 EPS. Analysts expect that Shell plc will post 8.16 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Shell Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, December 19th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 15th were paid a $0.688 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, November 15th. This represents a $2.75 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.23%. Shell’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 56.58%.

About Shell

Shell plc operates as an energy and petrochemical company Europe, Asia, Oceania, Africa, the United States, and Rest of the Americas. The company operates through Integrated Gas, Upstream, Marketing, Chemicals and Products, and Renewables and Energy Solutions segments. It explores for and extracts crude oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids; markets and transports oil and gas; produces gas-to-liquids fuels and other products; and operates upstream and midstream infrastructure to deliver gas to market.