Empower Advisory Group LLC Lowers Stake in HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ)

Empower Advisory Group LLC lowered its stake in shares of HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) by 17.7% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 9,676 shares of the computer maker’s stock after selling 2,082 shares during the period. Empower Advisory Group LLC’s holdings in HP were worth $316,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of HP by 16.1% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,153,924 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $41,391,000 after purchasing an additional 160,268 shares during the period. Oak Thistle LLC boosted its position in HP by 169.3% in the 4th quarter. Oak Thistle LLC now owns 34,682 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $1,132,000 after buying an additional 21,805 shares during the period. Tidal Investments LLC boosted its position in HP by 47.5% in the 3rd quarter. Tidal Investments LLC now owns 146,608 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $5,259,000 after buying an additional 47,230 shares during the period. MML Investors Services LLC boosted its position in HP by 35.0% in the 3rd quarter. MML Investors Services LLC now owns 62,523 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $2,243,000 after buying an additional 16,207 shares during the period. Finally, Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management boosted its position in HP by 4.3% in the 4th quarter. Empirical Financial Services LLC d.b.a. Empirical Wealth Management now owns 446,848 shares of the computer maker’s stock valued at $14,581,000 after buying an additional 18,557 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 77.53% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have commented on HPQ. HSBC cut shares of HP from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and decreased their price target for the company from $39.00 to $38.00 in a research report on Friday, November 29th. Sanford C. Bernstein raised their price target on shares of HP from $32.00 to $34.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. TD Cowen raised their price target on shares of HP from $32.00 to $39.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, November 27th. Barclays raised their price objective on shares of HP from $32.00 to $35.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, November 27th. Finally, Hsbc Global Res lowered shares of HP from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, November 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $36.23.

HP Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:HPQ opened at $34.72 on Thursday. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $33.10 and its 200 day moving average price is $34.81. HP Inc. has a 12 month low of $27.42 and a 12 month high of $39.79. The firm has a market capitalization of $32.56 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.36, a P/E/G ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.05.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, November 26th. The computer maker reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.93. HP had a net margin of 5.18% and a negative return on equity of 253.39%. The firm had revenue of $14.06 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.99 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.90 EPS. HP’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that HP Inc. will post 3.56 EPS for the current year.

HP Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 12th will be paid a dividend of $0.2894 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, March 12th. This represents a $1.16 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.33%. HP’s dividend payout ratio is currently 41.28%.

Insider Buying and Selling at HP

In other HP news, insider Alex Cho sold 10,298 shares of HP stock in a transaction on Friday, November 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $34.32, for a total value of $353,427.36. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 64,676 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,219,680.32. The trade was a 13.74 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Enrique Lores sold 137,094 shares of HP stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $36.45, for a total transaction of $4,997,076.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 89,272 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,253,964.40. This represents a 60.56 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 273,035 shares of company stock worth $9,670,068. 0.41% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

HP Profile

HP Inc provides products, technologies, software, solutions, and services to individual consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses, and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health, and education sectors worldwide. It operates through Personal Systems and Printing segments. The Personal Systems segment offers commercial personal computers (PCs), consumer PCs, workstations, thin clients, commercial tablets and mobility devices, retail point-of-sale systems, displays and other related accessories, software, support, and services for the commercial and consumer markets.