Unitil (NYSE:UTL) Now Covered by Huntington

Huntington initiated coverage on shares of Unitil (NYSE:UTL) in a report released on Wednesday morning,Zacks reports. The brokerage issued a strong-buy rating on the utilities provider’s stock.

Separately, Weiss Ratings downgraded shares of Unitil from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a report on Tuesday. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Unitil currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $58.67.

Unitil Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:UTL opened at $56.54 on Wednesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.05 billion, a PE ratio of 18.18 and a beta of 0.27. The company has a quick ratio of 0.45, a current ratio of 0.50 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.15. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $53.08 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $52.51. Unitil has a twelve month low of $46.91 and a twelve month high of $57.26.

Unitil (NYSE:UTL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, November 2nd. The utilities provider reported ($0.04) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of ($0.06) by $0.02. Unitil had a net margin of 9.16% and a return on equity of 9.19%. The company had revenue of $112.60 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $113.11 million. Equities analysts forecast that Unitil will post 3.31 EPS for the current year.

Unitil Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 30th. Investors of record on Friday, November 13th will be issued a dividend of $0.4750 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 13th. This represents a $1.90 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.4%. Unitil’s dividend payout ratio is 59.94%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Unitil

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. BlackRock Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Unitil during the second quarter worth about $152,441,000. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company purchased a new position in shares of Unitil during the 2nd quarter valued at about $26,864,000. Renaissance Technologies LLC raised its holdings in shares of Unitil by 23.5% during the 1st quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 490,041 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $25,600,000 after buying an additional 93,101 shares in the last quarter. Heartland Advisors Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Unitil during the 2nd quarter valued at about $12,242,000. Finally, ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its position in Unitil by 35.4% in the 3rd quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 181,808 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $9,229,000 after buying an additional 47,499 shares during the last quarter. 76.76% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Unitil

Unitil Corporation is a regulated public utility holding company that delivers electricity and natural gas to residential, commercial and industrial customers in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Its operations focus primarily on the distribution of energy through local utility networks rather than the production of electricity or natural gas.

Through its operating subsidiaries, Unitil provides electric distribution service in portions of New Hampshire and Massachusetts and natural gas distribution service in parts of southern New Hampshire and central Massachusetts.