Short Interest in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) Increases By 11.1%

Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) saw a large increase in short interest during the month of March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 8,810,000 shares, an increase of 11.1% from the March 15th total of 7,930,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 863,700 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 10.2 days.

Fortis Stock Performance

NYSE FTS opened at $37.14 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $18.31 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.15, a P/E/G ratio of 2.63 and a beta of 0.42. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a current ratio of 0.67 and a quick ratio of 0.58. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $39.14 and a two-hundred day moving average of $39.96. Fortis has a 1-year low of $36.30 and a 1-year high of $46.28.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Friday, February 9th. The utilities provider reported $0.53 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.52 by $0.01. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.00% and a net margin of 13.22%. The business had revenue of $2.12 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.39 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.53 earnings per share. As a group, analysts anticipate that Fortis will post 2.39 EPS for the current year.

Fortis Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Saturday, June 1st. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be given a dividend of $0.4382 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 16th. This is an increase from Fortis’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.44. This represents a $1.75 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.72%. Fortis’s payout ratio is currently 76.09%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Fortis

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in Fortis by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 19,842,130 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $816,107,000 after purchasing an additional 421,120 shares in the last quarter. FIL Ltd boosted its holdings in Fortis by 33.8% in the fourth quarter. FIL Ltd now owns 19,477,406 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $801,263,000 after purchasing an additional 4,924,031 shares in the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc boosted its holdings in Fortis by 22.3% in the fourth quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 13,380,619 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $553,145,000 after purchasing an additional 2,438,223 shares in the last quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank boosted its holdings in Fortis by 11.4% in the third quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 12,664,645 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $481,130,000 after purchasing an additional 1,294,939 shares in the last quarter. Finally, 1832 Asset Management L.P. boosted its holdings in Fortis by 0.6% in the fourth quarter. 1832 Asset Management L.P. now owns 9,519,651 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $381,167,000 after purchasing an additional 58,862 shares in the last quarter. 57.77% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, StockNews.com cut shares of Fortis from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Fortis presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $55.13.

Fortis Company Profile

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.