Bahl & Gaynor Inc. Purchases 903 Shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE)

Bahl & Gaynor Inc. increased its position in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) by 5.6% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 17,011 shares of the technology company’s stock after acquiring an additional 903 shares during the period. Bahl & Gaynor Inc.’s holdings in Hewlett Packard Enterprise were worth $289,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of HPE. Authentikos Wealth Advisory LLC bought a new stake in Hewlett Packard Enterprise during the 3rd quarter worth $31,000. Ritter Daniher Financial Advisory LLC DE bought a new stake in Hewlett Packard Enterprise during the 3rd quarter worth $33,000. Salem Investment Counselors Inc. grew its position in Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 180.1% during the 4th quarter. Salem Investment Counselors Inc. now owns 1,961 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $33,000 after acquiring an additional 1,261 shares during the last quarter. ORG Partners LLC grew its position in Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 111.4% during the 4th quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 2,615 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $44,000 after acquiring an additional 1,378 shares during the last quarter. Finally, NBC Securities Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise in the 3rd quarter valued at about $52,000. Institutional investors own 80.78% of the company’s stock.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Stock Up 1.2 %

HPE stock opened at $17.17 on Friday. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $17.04 and its 200 day simple moving average is $16.41. Hewlett Packard Enterprise has a fifty-two week low of $13.65 and a fifty-two week high of $20.07. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.37, a quick ratio of 0.63 and a current ratio of 0.89. The company has a market cap of $22.32 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.84, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.18 and a beta of 1.21.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 29th. The technology company reported $0.48 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.45 by $0.03. Hewlett Packard Enterprise had a return on equity of 9.12% and a net margin of 6.81%. The business had revenue of $6.76 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.09 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $0.38 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 13.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts expect that Hewlett Packard Enterprise will post 1.4 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, April 12th. Investors of record on Friday, March 15th were paid a dividend of $0.13 per share. This represents a $0.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.03%. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 14th. Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 35.86%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have commented on HPE shares. Evercore ISI reduced their price target on Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $19.00 to $18.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 1st. Morgan Stanley upped their price target on Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $16.00 to $19.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday, April 15th. Sanford C. Bernstein lowered Hewlett Packard Enterprise from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and reduced their price target for the company from $20.00 to $17.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 16th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price target on Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $20.00 to $18.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 1st. Finally, Barclays reduced their price target on Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $15.00 to $14.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, March 1st. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $17.91.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Hewlett Packard Enterprise news, SVP Jeremy Cox sold 18,323 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, April 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $16.96, for a total transaction of $310,758.08. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 15,541 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $263,575.36. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 0.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Profile

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company provides solutions that allow customers to capture, analyze, and act upon data seamlessly in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and Japan. It operates in six segments: Compute, HPC & AI, Storage, Intelligent Edge, Financial Services, and Corporate Investments and Other.