CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) PT Lowered to $30.00 at Morgan Stanley

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) had its price target decreased by investment analysts at Morgan Stanley from $31.00 to $30.00 in a research report issued to clients and investors on Monday, Benzinga reports. The firm currently has an “overweight” rating on the utilities provider’s stock. Morgan Stanley’s price target would suggest a potential downside of 4.06% from the company’s current price.

Other equities analysts have also issued reports about the company. KeyCorp increased their price objective on CenterPoint Energy from $31.00 to $33.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, May 20th. Barclays increased their target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Thursday, March 14th. StockNews.com cut shares of CenterPoint Energy from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday, June 7th. Finally, Scotiabank dropped their target price on shares of CenterPoint Energy from $31.00 to $29.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, April 22nd. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $30.70.

CenterPoint Energy Price Performance

NYSE:CNP traded up $0.27 during trading hours on Monday, hitting $31.27. The stock had a trading volume of 328,633 shares, compared to its average volume of 4,482,779. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $29.73 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $28.72. The firm has a market capitalization of $20.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.02, a P/E/G ratio of 2.75 and a beta of 0.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.81, a current ratio of 1.25 and a quick ratio of 1.06. CenterPoint Energy has a one year low of $25.42 and a one year high of $31.57.

CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 30th. The utilities provider reported $0.55 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.53 by $0.02. CenterPoint Energy had a return on equity of 10.57% and a net margin of 11.03%. The company had revenue of $2.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.82 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $0.50 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that CenterPoint Energy will post 1.62 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at CenterPoint Energy

In other CenterPoint Energy news, Director Barry T. Smitherman sold 5,670 shares of CenterPoint Energy stock in a transaction on Friday, May 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $29.42, for a total value of $166,811.40. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 21,203 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $623,792.26. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. 0.18% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of CenterPoint Energy

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in CNP. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC lifted its position in CenterPoint Energy by 174.9% during the first quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 6,535 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $190,000 after purchasing an additional 4,158 shares during the period. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale grew its position in CenterPoint Energy by 2.1% in the 1st quarter. DekaBank Deutsche Girozentrale now owns 104,896 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $2,923,000 after purchasing an additional 2,196 shares during the period. Boston Partners raised its stake in CenterPoint Energy by 3.3% during the 1st quarter. Boston Partners now owns 17,545,528 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $499,962,000 after buying an additional 556,802 shares during the last quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 40.7% during the 1st quarter. Cetera Advisors LLC now owns 20,359 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $580,000 after buying an additional 5,891 shares during the period. Finally, Cetera Investment Advisers boosted its stake in shares of CenterPoint Energy by 86.2% in the 1st quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 88,326 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $2,516,000 after buying an additional 40,878 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.77% of the company’s stock.

CenterPoint Energy Company Profile

CenterPoint Energy, Inc operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through two segments, Electric and Natural Gas. The Electric segment includes electric transmission and distribution services to electric customers and electric generation assets, as well as optimizes assets in the wholesale power market.