368 Shares in Ameren Co. (NYSE:AEE) Bought by First Command Advisory Services Inc.

First Command Advisory Services Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Ameren Co. (NYSE:AEE) during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund purchased 368 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $26,000.

Other large investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its stake in shares of Ameren by 1.4% during the 4th quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 898,638 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $65,007,000 after acquiring an additional 12,431 shares in the last quarter. Koshinski Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in Ameren by 493.0% in the 1st quarter. Koshinski Asset Management Inc. now owns 21,728 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $1,607,000 after buying an additional 18,064 shares during the last quarter. Putnam Investments LLC lifted its position in Ameren by 3.2% during the 4th quarter. Putnam Investments LLC now owns 5,112,645 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $369,849,000 after buying an additional 156,733 shares in the last quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC boosted its stake in shares of Ameren by 703.6% during the 1st quarter. SG Americas Securities LLC now owns 129,346 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $9,566,000 after buying an additional 113,250 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets increased its position in shares of Ameren by 83.9% in the fourth quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 264,835 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $19,158,000 after acquiring an additional 120,849 shares during the last quarter. 79.09% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on AEE shares. BMO Capital Markets increased their price objective on Ameren from $84.00 to $87.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, August 6th. UBS Group initiated coverage on shares of Ameren in a research note on Friday, July 19th. They set a “buy” rating and a $87.00 price objective on the stock. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of Ameren from $74.00 to $81.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. StockNews.com raised Ameren from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 8th. Finally, Barclays raised Ameren from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $73.00 to $77.00 in a research report on Thursday, May 30th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Ameren has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $80.10.

Insider Activity

In related news, Director Rafael Flores sold 1,500 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, June 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $71.29, for a total transaction of $106,935.00. Following the sale, the director now owns 13,768 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $981,520.72. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. 0.42% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Ameren Stock Performance

AEE opened at $82.60 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.40, a current ratio of 0.67 and a quick ratio of 0.45. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $76.16 and a 200 day simple moving average of $73.72. Ameren Co. has a 1 year low of $67.03 and a 1 year high of $84.40. The company has a market capitalization of $22.03 billion, a PE ratio of 18.99, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.71 and a beta of 0.44.

Ameren (NYSE:AEE) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The utilities provider reported $0.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.93 by $0.04. Ameren had a net margin of 16.28% and a return on equity of 10.20%. The company had revenue of $1.69 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.87 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.90 earnings per share. Ameren’s quarterly revenue was down 3.8% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts expect that Ameren Co. will post 4.61 EPS for the current year.

Ameren Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 30th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 11th will be issued a dividend of $0.67 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, September 11th. This represents a $2.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.24%. Ameren’s dividend payout ratio is presently 61.61%.

About Ameren

Ameren Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a public utility holding company in the United States. The company operates through four segments: Ameren Missouri, Ameren Illinois Electric Distribution, Ameren Illinois Natural Gas, and Ameren Transmission. It engages in the rate-regulated electric generation, transmission, and distribution activities; and rate-regulated natural gas distribution business.