Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ:HBAN) Short Interest Up 19.5% in March

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated (NASDAQ:HBAN) was the target of a large increase in short interest in the month of March. As of March 15th, there was short interest totalling 70,000,000 shares, an increase of 19.5% from the February 28th total of 58,600,000 shares. Approximately 4.9% of the shares of the company are short sold. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 21,990,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 3.2 days.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Robert W. Baird raised shares of Huntington Bancshares from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $18.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Friday, March 7th. Baird R W raised Huntington Bancshares from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, March 7th. StockNews.com raised Huntington Bancshares from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. Citigroup reduced their price target on Huntington Bancshares from $20.00 to $18.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, March 24th. Finally, Stephens reissued an “equal weight” rating and issued a $18.50 target price on shares of Huntington Bancshares in a research report on Friday, February 7th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating, fourteen have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Huntington Bancshares currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $18.18.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, VP Brendan A. Lawlor sold 3,521 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $15.25, for a total transaction of $53,695.25. Following the transaction, the vice president now owns 47,950 shares in the company, valued at $731,237.50. This represents a 6.84 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, VP Scott D. Kleinman sold 69,088 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $14.67, for a total value of $1,013,520.96. Following the sale, the vice president now directly owns 453,129 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,647,402.43. This represents a 13.23 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 111,781 shares of company stock valued at $1,631,151. Company insiders own 0.89% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 10.3% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 79,474,115 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $1,179,319,000 after acquiring an additional 7,439,909 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 3.5% in the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 64,926,419 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $1,056,353,000 after buying an additional 2,218,020 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. increased its stake in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 4.6% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 52,599,986 shares of the bank’s stock valued at $855,802,000 after buying an additional 2,310,502 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 1.3% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 36,880,662 shares of the bank’s stock worth $540,422,000 after acquiring an additional 473,893 shares during the last quarter. Finally, FMR LLC lifted its stake in shares of Huntington Bancshares by 36.9% in the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 32,479,039 shares of the bank’s stock worth $528,434,000 after acquiring an additional 8,759,871 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 80.72% of the company’s stock.

Huntington Bancshares Price Performance

Shares of Huntington Bancshares stock traded up $0.26 during midday trading on Wednesday, hitting $15.21. 16,506,239 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 16,926,541. Huntington Bancshares has a 12 month low of $12.05 and a 12 month high of $18.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.92, a quick ratio of 0.88 and a current ratio of 0.89. The stock has a market cap of $22.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.37, a PEG ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 1.07. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $15.95 and its 200-day moving average price is $16.16.

Huntington Bancshares (NASDAQ:HBAN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, January 17th. The bank reported $0.34 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.31 by $0.03. Huntington Bancshares had a return on equity of 11.23% and a net margin of 16.23%. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.27 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that Huntington Bancshares will post 1.39 earnings per share for the current year.

Huntington Bancshares Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, April 1st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, March 18th were paid a $0.155 dividend. This represents a $0.62 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.08%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, March 18th. Huntington Bancshares’s dividend payout ratio is currently 50.41%.

Huntington Bancshares Company Profile

Huntington Bancshares Incorporated operates as the bank holding company for The Huntington National Bank that provides commercial, consumer, and mortgage banking services in the United States. The company offers financial products and services to consumer and business customers, including deposits, lending, payments, mortgage banking, dealer financing, investment management, trust, brokerage, insurance, and other financial products and services.