Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) Rating Increased to Buy at Citigroup

Citigroup upgraded shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) from a neutral rating to a buy rating in a research note issued to investors on Friday, Marketbeat Ratings reports. They currently have $26.00 price target on the technology company’s stock, up from their previous price target of $23.00.

Several other research analysts have also recently commented on the company. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft started coverage on Hewlett Packard Enterprise in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. They set a “hold” rating and a $22.00 target price for the company. Raymond James upgraded shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $23.00 to $29.00 in a research note on Monday, November 18th. Barclays raised Hewlett Packard Enterprise from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price target for the company from $20.00 to $24.00 in a report on Wednesday, September 25th. UBS Group upped their target price on shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise from $17.00 to $19.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, September 5th. Finally, Bank of America raised Hewlett Packard Enterprise from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $21.00 to $24.00 in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $23.36.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Trading Up 10.6 %

Shares of NYSE HPE opened at $23.96 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $31.11 billion, a PE ratio of 12.61, a PEG ratio of 3.40 and a beta of 1.21. The company has a current ratio of 0.94, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $20.83 and a 200-day simple moving average of $19.85. Hewlett Packard Enterprise has a twelve month low of $14.47 and a twelve month high of $24.24.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE:HPE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, September 4th. The technology company reported $0.50 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.47 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $7.71 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $7.67 billion. Hewlett Packard Enterprise had a net margin of 6.39% and a return on equity of 8.94%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 10.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.35 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that Hewlett Packard Enterprise will post 1.83 earnings per share for the current year.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 16th. Shareholders of record on Friday, December 20th will be given a $0.13 dividend. This represents a $0.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.17%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, December 20th. Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s payout ratio is 27.37%.

Insider Transactions at Hewlett Packard Enterprise

In other news, EVP Fidelma Russo sold 55,908 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, October 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $19.99, for a total transaction of $1,117,600.92. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Antonio F. Neri sold 250,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, October 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $20.73, for a total value of $5,182,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,508,641 shares in the company, valued at approximately $31,274,127.93. The trade was a 14.22 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 426,012 shares of company stock valued at $8,599,617 in the last ninety days. 0.40% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. RPg Family Wealth Advisory LLC purchased a new stake in Hewlett Packard Enterprise in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $25,000. Valley Wealth Managers Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise during the 3rd quarter valued at $26,000. Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. boosted its holdings in Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 571.5% in the second quarter. Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. now owns 1,343 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 1,143 shares during the last quarter. Ashton Thomas Private Wealth LLC purchased a new stake in Hewlett Packard Enterprise during the 2nd quarter worth $28,000. Finally, Financial Management Professionals Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Hewlett Packard Enterprise by 80.3% during the 3rd quarter. Financial Management Professionals Inc. now owns 1,430 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $29,000 after buying an additional 637 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.78% of the company’s stock.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company Profile

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company provides solutions that allow customers to capture, analyze, and act upon data seamlessly in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Asia Pacific, and Japan. It operates in six segments: Compute, HPC & AI, Storage, Intelligent Edge, Financial Services, and Corporate Investments and Other.