Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ:HBAN) Sees Large Drop in Short Interest

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ:HBAN) was the target of a significant decrease in short interest during the month of August. As of August 31st, there was short interest totalling 26,930,000 shares, a decrease of 15.0% from the August 15th total of 31,680,000 shares. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 17,790,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 1.5 days.

Insider Activity

In other news, CFO Zachary Jacob Wasserman sold 33,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.13, for a total value of $499,290.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 265,809 shares in the company, valued at $4,021,690.17. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. In other news, CFO Zachary Jacob Wasserman sold 33,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.13, for a total value of $499,290.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 265,809 shares in the company, valued at $4,021,690.17. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, insider Helga Houston sold 11,288 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.02, for a total transaction of $169,545.76. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 618,832 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,294,856.64. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 116,622 shares of company stock worth $1,762,904 over the last three months. Insiders own 0.89% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Huntington Bancshares

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in HBAN. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC raised its holdings in Huntington Bancshares by 9.3% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Personalized Indexing Management LLC now owns 100,574 shares of the bank’s stock worth $1,279,000 after purchasing an additional 8,546 shares in the last quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC raised its holdings in Huntington Bancshares by 34.3% during the fourth quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 14,740 shares of the bank’s stock worth $188,000 after purchasing an additional 3,762 shares in the last quarter. NorthRock Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Huntington Bancshares during the fourth quarter worth approximately $178,000. Financial Advocates Investment Management raised its holdings in Huntington Bancshares by 5.9% during the fourth quarter. Financial Advocates Investment Management now owns 15,325 shares of the bank’s stock worth $195,000 after purchasing an additional 856 shares in the last quarter. Finally, ING Groep NV increased its holdings in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 2.1% in the 4th quarter. ING Groep NV now owns 189,678 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $2,413,000 after acquiring an additional 3,987 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.72% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on HBAN shares. UBS Group dropped their price objective on shares of Huntington Bancshares from $16.00 to $15.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, June 13th. Argus upped their price objective on shares of Huntington Bancshares from $15.00 to $16.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, July 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on shares of Huntington Bancshares from $17.00 to $16.50 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, June 27th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their target price on shares of Huntington Bancshares from $15.00 to $14.50 and set a “market perform” rating for the company in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, StockNews.com lowered shares of Huntington Bancshares from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Monday, September 2nd. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, six have issued a hold rating, eleven have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $15.59.

Huntington Bancshares Stock Up 1.8 %

NASDAQ:HBAN traded up $0.26 during mid-day trading on Monday, hitting $14.64. The stock had a trading volume of 11,588,206 shares, compared to its average volume of 16,596,238. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $14.21 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $13.69. The company has a market capitalization of $21.22 billion, a PE ratio of 12.95, a PEG ratio of 2.90 and a beta of 1.05. Huntington Bancshares has a twelve month low of $9.25 and a twelve month high of $15.24. The company has a current ratio of 0.89, a quick ratio of 0.88 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.96.

Huntington Bancshares (NASDAQ:HBAN) last issued its earnings results on Friday, July 19th. The bank reported $0.30 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.28 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $2.97 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.81 billion. Huntington Bancshares had a net margin of 14.77% and a return on equity of 11.34%. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.35 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Huntington Bancshares will post 1.19 EPS for the current year.

Huntington Bancshares Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, October 1st. Investors of record on Tuesday, September 17th will be issued a $0.155 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, September 17th. This represents a $0.62 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.23%. Huntington Bancshares’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 55.86%.

About Huntington Bancshares

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated operates as the bank holding company for The Huntington National Bank that provides commercial, consumer, and mortgage banking services in the United States. The company offers financial products and services to consumer and business customers, including deposits, lending, payments, mortgage banking, dealer financing, investment management, trust, brokerage, insurance, and other financial products and services.