Natixis Advisors LLC Boosts Stake in Xcel Energy Inc. $XEL

Natixis Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of Xcel Energy Inc. (NASDAQ:XEL) by 4.2% during the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 341,507 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 13,739 shares during the period. Natixis Advisors LLC’s holdings in Xcel Energy were worth $27,542,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Xcel Energy by 2.7% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 76,725,720 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,187,929,000 after acquiring an additional 2,001,018 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of Xcel Energy by 0.4% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 34,144,257 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,344,295,000 after acquiring an additional 126,790 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE increased its position in Xcel Energy by 9.0% during the 2nd quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 26,262,079 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,788,448,000 after purchasing an additional 2,157,602 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its stake in Xcel Energy by 4.1% in the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 21,026,015 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,695,748,000 after purchasing an additional 831,639 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA raised its stake in Xcel Energy by 4.3% in the 3rd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 19,526,873 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,574,842,000 after purchasing an additional 807,353 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 78.38% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts have issued reports on XEL shares. Argus raised shares of Xcel Energy to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 3rd. BTIG Research set a $94.00 price objective on shares of Xcel Energy in a research report on Friday, January 30th. KeyCorp reduced their price objective on shares of Xcel Energy from $85.00 to $84.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, December 12th. BMO Capital Markets restated an “outperform” rating and set a $90.00 target price on shares of Xcel Energy in a research report on Friday, February 6th. Finally, Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Xcel Energy from $85.00 to $82.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, January 15th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twelve have given a Buy rating, one has given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Xcel Energy has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $88.60.

Xcel Energy Stock Down 0.3%

XEL opened at $81.88 on Wednesday. Xcel Energy Inc. has a 12 month low of $65.21 and a 12 month high of $84.23. The business has a 50-day moving average of $77.98 and a two-hundred day moving average of $77.58. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.35, a current ratio of 0.71 and a quick ratio of 0.60. The stock has a market capitalization of $51.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.25 and a beta of 0.45.

Xcel Energy (NASDAQ:XEL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.96 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.96. Xcel Energy had a net margin of 13.76% and a return on equity of 10.46%. The business had revenue of $3.56 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.77 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.81 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 14.1% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts expect that Xcel Energy Inc. will post 3.82 earnings per share for the current year.

Xcel Energy Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 20th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be paid a dividend of $0.5925 per share. This is an increase from Xcel Energy’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.57. This represents a $2.37 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.9%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 13th. Xcel Energy’s payout ratio is 66.67%.

About Xcel Energy

Xcel Energy (NASDAQ: XEL) is a Minneapolis-based, publicly traded utility holding company that develops, owns and operates regulated electricity and natural gas delivery systems. The company’s core activities include generation, transmission and distribution of electricity, the delivery of natural gas to customers, and related customer service operations. Xcel provides a mix of utility services to residential, commercial and industrial customers and participates in wholesale energy markets where appropriate.

Its generation portfolio combines nuclear, natural gas, coal and a growing share of renewable resources such as wind and solar.