Argent Trust Co Purchases 6,543 Shares of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T)

Argent Trust Co grew its stake in shares of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) by 3.4% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 200,749 shares of the technology company’s stock after acquiring an additional 6,543 shares during the quarter. Argent Trust Co’s holdings in AT&T were worth $4,571,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of AT&T in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $1,858,418,000. GQG Partners LLC grew its holdings in shares of AT&T by 37.3% in the fourth quarter. GQG Partners LLC now owns 96,779,385 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,203,667,000 after purchasing an additional 26,280,866 shares in the last quarter. Assetmark Inc. lifted its position in shares of AT&T by 4,986.1% during the fourth quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 9,913,960 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $225,741,000 after purchasing an additional 9,719,036 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. grew its stake in AT&T by 18.2% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 47,651,898 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,085,034,000 after purchasing an additional 7,347,354 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in AT&T by 1.0% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 642,859,644 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $14,637,914,000 after buying an additional 6,220,442 shares during the last quarter. 57.10% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently weighed in on T shares. Oppenheimer increased their price target on AT&T from $27.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 1st. Royal Bank of Canada upped their target price on AT&T from $27.00 to $28.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 19th. Citigroup reissued a “buy” rating on shares of AT&T in a report on Monday. Argus raised AT&T from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $27.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Thursday, January 16th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised AT&T from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price target for the company from $19.00 to $28.00 in a report on Monday, December 16th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating, seventeen have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $27.24.

AT&T Trading Up 1.5 %

Shares of AT&T stock traded up $0.40 during trading hours on Thursday, hitting $26.59. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 5,629,361 shares, compared to its average volume of 36,782,682. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.00, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a current ratio of 0.66. The stock has a market cap of $190.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.84, a P/E/G ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.42. AT&T Inc. has a twelve month low of $15.94 and a twelve month high of $29.03. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $26.50 and a 200-day moving average of $23.90.

AT&T (NYSE:T) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, January 27th. The technology company reported $0.54 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.48 by $0.06. AT&T had a return on equity of 13.97% and a net margin of 8.95%. Research analysts forecast that AT&T Inc. will post 2.14 EPS for the current year.

AT&T Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be given a dividend of $0.2775 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $1.11 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.18%. AT&T’s payout ratio is currently 74.50%.

AT&T Profile

AT&T, Inc is a holding company, which engages in the provision of telecommunications and technology services. It operates through the Communications and Latin America segments. The Communications segment offers wireless, wireline telecom, and broadband services to businesses and consumers located in the US and businesses globally.