Toronto Dominion Bank Sells 560,827 Shares of TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC)

Toronto Dominion Bank reduced its holdings in shares of TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) by 24.4% during the second quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 1,734,936 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after selling 560,827 shares during the period. Toronto Dominion Bank’s holdings in TransAlta were worth $12,283,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the business. BNP Paribas Financial Markets lifted its position in TransAlta by 147.2% during the fourth quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 64,434 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $535,000 after purchasing an additional 38,365 shares during the period. TD Asset Management Inc lifted its holdings in shares of TransAlta by 2.6% during the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 3,902,599 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $32,615,000 after buying an additional 98,334 shares during the period. Scotia Capital Inc. boosted its stake in shares of TransAlta by 5.7% in the 4th quarter. Scotia Capital Inc. now owns 1,882,014 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $15,525,000 after buying an additional 101,707 shares during the last quarter. Bank of Nova Scotia grew its holdings in shares of TransAlta by 93.8% in the fourth quarter. Bank of Nova Scotia now owns 1,525,761 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $12,688,000 after acquiring an additional 738,338 shares during the period. Finally, Campbell & CO Investment Adviser LLC bought a new stake in shares of TransAlta in the fourth quarter worth $403,000. 59.00% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, StockNews.com lowered shares of TransAlta from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday.

TransAlta Trading Down 1.2 %

Shares of TAC stock opened at $10.36 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.43, a current ratio of 0.84 and a quick ratio of 0.75. The company has a market cap of $3.09 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 6.68 and a beta of 0.91. TransAlta Co. has a 1 year low of $5.94 and a 1 year high of $10.60. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $8.56 and a 200-day moving average price of $7.43.

TransAlta (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The utilities provider reported $0.13 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.05 by $0.08. TransAlta had a return on equity of 47.71% and a net margin of 18.41%. The business had revenue of $425.37 million during the quarter. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.17 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that TransAlta Co. will post 0.75 earnings per share for the current year.

TransAlta Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, October 1st. Shareholders of record on Sunday, September 1st will be paid a dividend of $0.044 per share. This is a boost from TransAlta’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.04. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, August 30th. This represents a $0.18 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.70%. TransAlta’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 10.97%.

TransAlta Profile

TransAlta Corporation engages in the development, production, and sale of electric energy. It operates through Hydro, Wind and Solar, Gas, Energy Transition, and Energy Marketing segments. The Hydro segment holds interest of approximately 922 megawatts (MW) of owned hydroelectric generating capacity located in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario.