Headlands Technologies LLC Increases Stock Position in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL)

Headlands Technologies LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) by 5,567.4% in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 24,540 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock after purchasing an additional 24,107 shares during the period. Headlands Technologies LLC’s holdings in Halliburton were worth $829,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the business. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its holdings in Halliburton by 46.0% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 61,090,055 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $2,408,171,000 after buying an additional 19,237,784 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Halliburton in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $400,070,000. LSV Asset Management raised its holdings in Halliburton by 24,954.1% during the second quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 2,730,900 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $92,250,000 after purchasing an additional 2,720,000 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Halliburton by 2.7% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 100,274,105 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $3,952,805,000 after purchasing an additional 2,618,740 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its holdings in Halliburton by 116.9% in the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 2,483,230 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $97,889,000 after purchasing an additional 1,338,371 shares during the last quarter. 85.23% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on HAL shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on Halliburton from $45.00 to $40.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, July 22nd. StockNews.com cut shares of Halliburton from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 3rd. Morgan Stanley lowered their price target on shares of Halliburton from $47.00 to $45.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, July 22nd. Johnson Rice upgraded Halliburton to a “moderate buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 19th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada lowered their target price on Halliburton from $45.00 to $44.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, July 22nd. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, sixteen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $44.88.

Halliburton Stock Performance

NYSE HAL opened at $27.97 on Thursday. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $32.12 and its 200 day moving average price is $35.15. The company has a current ratio of 2.13, a quick ratio of 1.54 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.76. Halliburton has a twelve month low of $27.52 and a twelve month high of $43.85. The company has a market capitalization of $24.76 billion, a PE ratio of 9.68, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.97 and a beta of 1.89.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Friday, July 19th. The oilfield services company reported $0.80 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.80. Halliburton had a net margin of 11.61% and a return on equity of 29.97%. The business had revenue of $5.83 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.95 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.77 EPS. The company’s revenue was up .6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts predict that Halliburton will post 3.14 earnings per share for the current year.

Halliburton Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 25th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th will be issued a $0.17 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.43%. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 23.53%.

Insider Activity

In related news, EVP Van H. Beckwith sold 10,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $36.75, for a total value of $367,500.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 273,908 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $10,066,119. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Corporate insiders own 0.61% of the company’s stock.

Halliburton Company Profile

Halliburton Company provides products and services to the energy industry worldwide. It operates through two segments, Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. The Completion and Production segment offers production enhancement services that include stimulation and sand control services; cementing services, such as well bonding and casing, and casing equipment; and completion tools that offer downhole solutions and services, including well completion products and services, intelligent well completions, and service tools, as well as liner hanger, sand control, and multilateral systems.