Nuveen LLC Acquires Shares of 2,863,118 Halliburton Company (NYSE:HAL)

Nuveen LLC bought a new stake in Halliburton Company (NYSE:HAL) in the first quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm bought 2,863,118 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock, valued at approximately $72,637,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the business. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its position in Halliburton by 450.9% during the first quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 29,941,771 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $759,623,000 after purchasing an additional 24,506,472 shares during the last quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC boosted its stake in shares of Halliburton by 15.6% in the fourth quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 16,093,680 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $437,587,000 after purchasing an additional 2,171,722 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in shares of Halliburton by 7.3% in the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 10,813,905 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $274,349,000 after purchasing an additional 731,105 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp boosted its stake in shares of Halliburton by 16.2% in the fourth quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 9,184,850 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $249,736,000 after purchasing an additional 1,283,094 shares during the period. Finally, LSV Asset Management lifted its stake in Halliburton by 3.3% in the first quarter. LSV Asset Management now owns 6,113,044 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $155,088,000 after acquiring an additional 193,022 shares during the last quarter. 85.23% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on HAL. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price target on shares of Halliburton from $31.00 to $29.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, July 23rd. Barclays cut their target price on shares of Halliburton from $26.00 to $22.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, July 23rd. Royal Bank Of Canada dropped their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $28.00 to $24.00 and set a “sector perform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, July 23rd. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $34.00 to $28.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, May 16th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company decreased their target price on shares of Halliburton from $28.00 to $26.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, July 23rd. Eight analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Halliburton presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $31.00.

Halliburton Price Performance

NYSE:HAL opened at $21.16 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $18.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 9.89, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.67 and a beta of 1.12. The company has a current ratio of 2.00, a quick ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. The company’s 50-day moving average is $21.63 and its two-hundred day moving average is $22.63. Halliburton Company has a 12-month low of $18.72 and a 12-month high of $32.57.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 22nd. The oilfield services company reported $0.55 EPS for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.55. Halliburton had a net margin of 8.37% and a return on equity of 21.45%. The company had revenue of $5.51 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.43 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.80 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 5.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts expect that Halliburton Company will post 2.64 EPS for the current year.

Halliburton Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 24th. Investors of record on Wednesday, September 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.2%. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 31.78%.

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.