Fulton Bank N.A. Raises Holdings in CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP)

Fulton Bank N.A. raised its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CNP) by 25.3% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 8,818 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 1,780 shares during the period. Fulton Bank N.A.’s holdings in CenterPoint Energy were worth $273,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in CNP. Crewe Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in CenterPoint Energy during the 1st quarter valued at $25,000. Global Retirement Partners LLC boosted its stake in CenterPoint Energy by 163.7% during the 4th quarter. Global Retirement Partners LLC now owns 894 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $26,000 after purchasing an additional 555 shares during the last quarter. FinTrust Capital Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 60.3% in the 1st quarter. FinTrust Capital Advisors LLC now owns 1,201 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $34,000 after buying an additional 452 shares during the last quarter. Tobam purchased a new position in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 1st quarter worth $35,000. Finally, ICA Group Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of CenterPoint Energy in the 4th quarter worth $43,000. 91.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

CNP has been the topic of a number of research reports. StockNews.com upgraded CenterPoint Energy from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 31st. Scotiabank dropped their price target on CenterPoint Energy from $31.00 to $29.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, April 22nd. KeyCorp downgraded CenterPoint Energy from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a research note on Friday. BMO Capital Markets downgraded CenterPoint Energy from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $31.00 to $28.00 in a research note on Friday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. downgraded CenterPoint Energy from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $32.00 to $29.00 in a research note on Friday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, CenterPoint Energy presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $29.90.

CenterPoint Energy Stock Performance

CenterPoint Energy stock traded down $0.16 during trading on Tuesday, reaching $25.77. The company had a trading volume of 7,447,867 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,990,087. The company has a current ratio of 1.20, a quick ratio of 1.06 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.79. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $29.75 and its 200 day simple moving average is $28.84. The firm has a market capitalization of $16.54 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.15, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 0.92. CenterPoint Energy, Inc. has a 52 week low of $25.42 and a 52 week high of $31.57.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 30th. The utilities provider reported $0.36 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.32 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $1.91 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.88 billion. CenterPoint Energy had a return on equity of 10.81% and a net margin of 12.28%. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.28 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts forecast that CenterPoint Energy, Inc. will post 1.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

CenterPoint Energy Company Profile

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.