Scotia Capital Inc. Acquires 10,547 Shares of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T)

Scotia Capital Inc. increased its stake in shares of AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) by 1.5% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 729,046 shares of the technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 10,547 shares during the quarter. Scotia Capital Inc.’s holdings in AT&T were worth $16,601,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. F M Investments LLC boosted its holdings in AT&T by 62.7% during the fourth quarter. F M Investments LLC now owns 15,798 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $360,000 after buying an additional 6,086 shares during the last quarter. Texas Yale Capital Corp. raised its position in shares of AT&T by 0.6% in the 4th quarter. Texas Yale Capital Corp. now owns 245,416 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $5,588,000 after acquiring an additional 1,450 shares during the period. Faithward Advisors LLC boosted its stake in AT&T by 8.5% during the 4th quarter. Faithward Advisors LLC now owns 28,720 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $654,000 after acquiring an additional 2,246 shares during the last quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. grew its holdings in AT&T by 344.5% during the fourth quarter. APG Asset Management N.V. now owns 4,849,706 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $106,642,000 after purchasing an additional 3,758,582 shares during the period. Finally, Advisory Services Network LLC increased its stake in AT&T by 31.9% in the fourth quarter. Advisory Services Network LLC now owns 400,205 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $9,113,000 after purchasing an additional 96,684 shares in the last quarter. 57.10% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts recently commented on the company. Sanford C. Bernstein raised their price objective on AT&T from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Morgan Stanley upgraded AT&T from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $19.00 to $28.00 in a research report on Monday, December 16th. DZ Bank upgraded AT&T from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $27.00 target price for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 29th. Oppenheimer upped their price objective on AT&T from $27.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 1st. Finally, Scotiabank increased their price objective on AT&T from $28.50 to $29.00 and gave the stock a “sector outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, seventeen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, AT&T presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $27.24.

AT&T Trading Down 0.4 %

Shares of T stock opened at $26.38 on Friday. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $26.54 and a 200 day simple moving average of $23.94. AT&T Inc. has a 1 year low of $15.94 and a 1 year high of $29.03. The company has a current ratio of 0.66, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.00. The stock has a market cap of $189.33 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.70, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.42.

AT&T (NYSE:T) last posted its quarterly earnings data 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 net margin of 8.95% and a return on equity of 13.97%. On average, research analysts predict that AT&T Inc. will post 2.14 earnings per share for the current fiscal 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 of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. This represents a $1.11 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.21%. AT&T’s dividend 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.