CHURCHILL MANAGEMENT Corp Purchases 11,206 Shares of Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

CHURCHILL MANAGEMENT Corp raised its position in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) by 8.0% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm owned 150,759 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock after buying an additional 11,206 shares during the quarter. CHURCHILL MANAGEMENT Corp’s holdings in Verizon Communications were worth $6,029,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in VZ. One Capital Management LLC raised its position in Verizon Communications by 34.9% during the second quarter. One Capital Management LLC now owns 11,346 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $468,000 after purchasing an additional 2,937 shares in the last quarter. Edgestream Partners L.P. purchased a new stake in Verizon Communications in the second quarter worth approximately $2,015,000. Bradley Foster & Sargent Inc. CT boosted its stake in Verizon Communications by 1.6% in the second quarter. Bradley Foster & Sargent Inc. CT now owns 41,924 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $1,729,000 after buying an additional 643 shares in the last quarter. E Fund Management Co. Ltd. grew its position in Verizon Communications by 12.9% during the second quarter. E Fund Management Co. Ltd. now owns 26,212 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $1,081,000 after acquiring an additional 2,997 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Meridian Wealth Partners LLC purchased a new position in shares of Verizon Communications during the second quarter worth approximately $348,000. 62.06% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

VZ has been the subject of a number of research reports. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $44.00 to $45.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Sanford C. Bernstein initiated coverage on shares of Verizon Communications in a research report on Tuesday, December 10th. They set a “market perform” rating and a $48.00 price target for the company. StockNews.com downgraded Verizon Communications from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 16th. KeyCorp cut Verizon Communications from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Thursday, October 24th. Finally, Citigroup lifted their price target on Verizon Communications from $47.00 to $49.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, September 25th. Ten research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $46.54.

Verizon Communications Stock Performance

Shares of VZ stock opened at $38.17 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.62, a current ratio of 0.66 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $41.17 and a 200 day moving average of $41.76. The firm has a market capitalization of $160.68 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 16.45, a PEG ratio of 3.05 and a beta of 0.46. Verizon Communications Inc. has a 52 week low of $37.58 and a 52 week high of $45.36.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, October 22nd. The cell phone carrier reported $1.19 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.18 by $0.01. Verizon Communications had a net margin of 7.30% and a return on equity of 20.05%. The firm had revenue of $33.30 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $33.42 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.22 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up .9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts expect that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.61 earnings per share for the current year.

Verizon Communications Cuts Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, February 3rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 10th will be issued a dividend of $0.6775 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 10th. This represents a $2.71 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 7.10%. Verizon Communications’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 116.81%.

Verizon Communications Profile

Verizon Communications Inc, through its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of communications, technology, information, and entertainment products and services to consumers, businesses, and governmental entities worldwide. It operates in two segments, Verizon Consumer Group (Consumer) and Verizon Business Group (Business).