AES (NYSE:AES) Now Covered by HSBC

Stock analysts at HSBC began coverage on shares of AES (NYSE:AES) in a report issued on Friday,Briefing.com Automated Import reports. The firm set a “buy” rating and a $17.00 price target on the utilities provider’s stock. HSBC’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 25.69% from the stock’s current price.

Several other research analysts have also recently weighed in on the company. Susquehanna reduced their price objective on AES from $24.00 to $21.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, November 5th. Mizuho reduced their price objective on AES from $24.00 to $16.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, November 21st. Bank of America began coverage on AES in a research report on Monday, November 25th. They set an “underperform” rating and a $11.00 price objective for the company. Barclays increased their price target on AES from $22.00 to $23.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, October 21st. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group began coverage on AES in a research report on Wednesday, September 11th. They set a “buy” rating and a $20.00 price target for the company. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, eight have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $19.90.

AES Trading Down 0.5 %

NYSE AES opened at $13.53 on Friday. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $15.10 and a 200 day simple moving average of $17.20. The company has a market capitalization of $9.62 billion, a PE ratio of 9.39, a P/E/G ratio of 0.68 and a beta of 1.01. The company has a current ratio of 0.85, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.21. AES has a 12 month low of $12.53 and a 12 month high of $22.21.

AES (NYSE:AES) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The utilities provider reported $0.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.60 by $0.11. The company had revenue of $3.29 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.46 billion. AES had a return on equity of 27.30% and a net margin of 8.34%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 4.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.60 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that AES will post 1.95 EPS for the current year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On AES

A number of hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Franklin Resources Inc. increased its stake in AES by 12.8% during the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 2,930,901 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $58,794,000 after acquiring an additional 333,154 shares during the period. Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB bought a new position in shares of AES in the 3rd quarter valued at $139,000. Sanctuary Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of AES by 3.5% in the 3rd quarter. Sanctuary Advisors LLC now owns 34,067 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $683,000 after purchasing an additional 1,141 shares during the last quarter. Neo Ivy Capital Management bought a new position in shares of AES in the 3rd quarter valued at $204,000. Finally, Gould Capital LLC bought a new position in shares of AES in the 3rd quarter valued at $3,402,000. Institutional investors own 93.13% of the company’s stock.

About AES

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market.