Magnetar Financial LLC Makes New $649,000 Investment in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

Magnetar Financial LLC purchased a new position in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) in the first quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm purchased 40,534 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock, valued at approximately $649,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in TU. Capital Research Global Investors raised its position in shares of TELUS by 215.8% during the 4th quarter. Capital Research Global Investors now owns 22,214,210 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $395,314,000 after acquiring an additional 15,179,110 shares in the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc increased its position in TELUS by 18.4% in the fourth quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 40,669,392 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $727,275,000 after buying an additional 6,334,692 shares during the period. Clearbridge Investments LLC acquired a new stake in TELUS in the fourth quarter worth $109,327,000. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in TELUS in the fourth quarter worth $82,775,000. Finally, The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company increased its position in TELUS by 15.5% in the fourth quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 28,705,377 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $511,646,000 after buying an additional 3,860,487 shares during the period. 49.40% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

TELUS Stock Performance

TU traded down $0.04 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $15.84. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 91,063 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,277,305. The stock has a market cap of $23.47 billion, a P/E ratio of 40.72, a PEG ratio of 2.40 and a beta of 0.74. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $15.83 and a 200 day simple moving average of $16.55. The company has a current ratio of 0.75, a quick ratio of 0.70 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.42. TELUS Co. has a twelve month low of $14.63 and a twelve month high of $19.14.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 9th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.19 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.18 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $3.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.73 billion. TELUS had a return on equity of 7.90% and a net margin of 3.73%. Research analysts expect that TELUS Co. will post 0.75 earnings per share for the current year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, July 2nd. Investors of record on Monday, June 10th were paid a $0.282 dividend. This is a positive change from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. The ex-dividend date was Monday, June 10th. This represents a $1.13 annualized dividend and a yield of 7.12%. TELUS’s payout ratio is currently 292.32%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, StockNews.com lowered TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Friday, June 14th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, TELUS has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $26.20.

TELUS Profile

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.