Howard Financial Services LTD. Buys New Stake in EQT Co. (NYSE:EQT)

Howard Financial Services LTD. bought a new position in shares of EQT Co. (NYSE:EQT) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm bought 4,830 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock, valued at approximately $223,000.

Other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Canoe Financial LP boosted its stake in EQT by 1.7% during the 4th quarter. Canoe Financial LP now owns 2,542,000 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $116,750,000 after purchasing an additional 42,000 shares during the period. Somerset Trust Co bought a new stake in shares of EQT in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $354,000. Merit Financial Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of EQT in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $214,000. Procyon Advisors LLC grew its stake in shares of EQT by 55.3% in the fourth quarter. Procyon Advisors LLC now owns 37,081 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock worth $1,710,000 after acquiring an additional 13,209 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Steph & Co. increased its position in EQT by 27.6% during the fourth quarter. Steph & Co. now owns 7,480 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock worth $345,000 after acquiring an additional 1,618 shares during the period. 90.81% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

EQT Stock Performance

NYSE EQT opened at $52.93 on Friday. EQT Co. has a 1-year low of $30.02 and a 1-year high of $53.98. The company has a 50 day moving average of $45.83 and a 200-day moving average of $38.77. The company has a current ratio of 0.51, a quick ratio of 0.51 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.65. The firm has a market cap of $31.58 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 63.02 and a beta of 1.12.

EQT (NYSE:EQT) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The oil and gas producer reported $0.12 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.06 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $1.28 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.35 billion. EQT had a return on equity of 3.74% and a net margin of 5.52%. The business’s revenue was up 8.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $0.30 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that EQT Co. will post 1.44 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of analysts have weighed in on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on shares of EQT from $50.00 to $53.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on EQT from $52.00 to $53.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 8th. Sanford C. Bernstein raised EQT from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $73.00 price target for the company in a report on Wednesday. Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price objective on EQT from $45.00 to $55.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Finally, UBS Group boosted their price objective on EQT from $40.00 to $42.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, November 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, EQT has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $49.89.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Thomas F. Karam sold 30,154 shares of EQT stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $44.83, for a total value of $1,351,803.82. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 201,608 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,038,086.64. This trade represents a 13.01 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Insiders own 0.63% of the company’s stock.

About EQT

EQT Corporation operates as a natural gas production company in the United States. The company sells natural gas and natural gas liquids to marketers, utilities, and industrial customers through pipelines located in the Appalachian Basin. It also offers marketing services and contractual pipeline capacity management services.