Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) Shares Purchased by Empowered Funds LLC

Empowered Funds LLC raised its position in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) by 23.4% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 317,188 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock after purchasing an additional 60,081 shares during the quarter. Empowered Funds LLC’s holdings in Halliburton were worth $8,624,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Franklin Resources Inc. grew its position in Halliburton by 244.5% in the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 4,513,560 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $138,025,000 after buying an additional 3,203,224 shares in the last quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Halliburton by 23.1% in the third quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 16,782,174 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $487,522,000 after acquiring an additional 3,150,986 shares in the last quarter. Thompson Siegel & Walmsley LLC acquired a new position in shares of Halliburton during the third quarter valued at approximately $55,132,000. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans raised its holdings in Halliburton by 22.0% during the third quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 5,520,383 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $160,367,000 after purchasing an additional 995,649 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Banco Santander S.A. bought a new stake in Halliburton during the third quarter worth approximately $13,085,000. Institutional investors own 85.23% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Raymond James cut Halliburton from a “strong-buy” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Benchmark lowered their target price on Halliburton from $40.00 to $35.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 23rd. Wells Fargo & Company cut their price target on shares of Halliburton from $39.00 to $34.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. UBS Group cut shares of Halliburton from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and lowered their price objective for the stock from $36.00 to $34.00 in a research note on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Susquehanna cut their target price on shares of Halliburton from $42.00 to $40.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, November 8th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $37.42.

Halliburton Trading Down 1.2 %

NYSE:HAL opened at $25.17 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $22.11 billion, a PE ratio of 8.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.53 and a beta of 1.89. Halliburton has a fifty-two week low of $25.16 and a fifty-two week high of $41.56. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a current ratio of 2.05 and a quick ratio of 1.54. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $27.74 and its two-hundred day moving average is $29.38.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 7th. The oilfield services company reported $0.73 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.75 by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $5.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.83 billion. Halliburton had a net margin of 10.90% and a return on equity of 26.03%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.79 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Halliburton will post 2.67 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Halliburton Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, December 26th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, December 4th were paid a $0.17 dividend. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.70%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, December 4th. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 24.03%.

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.