Partners Group Holding AG Sells 407,402 Shares of Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS)

Partners Group Holding AG trimmed its stake in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) by 97.1% in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 12,364 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after selling 407,402 shares during the quarter. Partners Group Holding AG’s holdings in Fortis were worth $558,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Fortis by 123.5% in the 1st quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 666 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $26,000 after buying an additional 368 shares in the last quarter. Ridgewood Investments LLC purchased a new stake in Fortis during the second quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Bessemer Group Inc. boosted its stake in Fortis by 53.6% in the first quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 992 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $40,000 after acquiring an additional 346 shares in the last quarter. Cromwell Holdings LLC grew its holdings in Fortis by 52.2% in the third quarter. Cromwell Holdings LLC now owns 1,837 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $83,000 after purchasing an additional 630 shares during the last quarter. Finally, 1620 Investment Advisors Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Fortis during the second quarter worth $80,000. 57.77% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

FTS has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Bank of America assumed coverage on Fortis in a research report on Friday, September 20th. They set an “underperform” rating on the stock. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Fortis from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Sunday, August 4th. UBS Group upgraded shares of Fortis to a “strong sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 10th. Finally, Raymond James lowered shares of Fortis from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 6th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and two have issued a hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Fortis currently has a consensus rating of “Reduce”.

Fortis Stock Performance

Shares of FTS opened at $45.02 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.26, a quick ratio of 0.58 and a current ratio of 0.69. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $44.37 and a two-hundred day moving average of $42.37. The stock has a market cap of $22.39 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.91, a P/E/G ratio of 4.13 and a beta of 0.47. Fortis Inc. has a one year low of $36.86 and a one year high of $46.06.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, November 5th. The utilities provider reported $0.85 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.59 by $0.26. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.03% and a net margin of 14.06%. The firm had revenue of $2.03 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.01 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.63 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts predict that Fortis Inc. will post 2.32 EPS for the current year.

Fortis Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Sunday, December 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, November 18th will be paid a $0.615 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 18th. This represents a $2.46 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 5.46%. This is a positive change from Fortis’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.43. Fortis’s dividend payout ratio is presently 76.47%.

About Fortis

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.