Evanson Asset Management LLC Lowers Stake in AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T)

Evanson Asset Management LLC cut its stake in AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) by 12.8% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 13,576 shares of the technology company’s stock after selling 1,995 shares during the period. Evanson Asset Management LLC’s holdings in AT&T were worth $309,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in AT&T by 2.3% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 161,120,657 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $3,532,684,000 after purchasing an additional 3,630,972 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its holdings in shares of AT&T by 1.9% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 60,986,064 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,341,693,000 after buying an additional 1,149,688 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc lifted its stake in shares of AT&T by 2.7% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 60,109,127 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,148,689,000 after acquiring an additional 1,569,374 shares during the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. boosted its holdings in AT&T by 2.0% during the 2nd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 51,558,884 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $985,307,000 after acquiring an additional 1,007,228 shares during the period. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC grew its position in AT&T by 43.3% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 21,853,624 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $414,563,000 after acquiring an additional 6,602,586 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 57.10% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

T has been the subject of several recent research reports. Morgan Stanley upgraded AT&T from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $19.00 to $28.00 in a research report on Monday, December 16th. UBS Group increased their price target on shares of AT&T from $25.00 to $30.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Royal Bank of Canada upgraded shares of AT&T from a “sector perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $22.00 to $26.00 in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Hsbc Global Res raised shares of AT&T to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 1st. Finally, Barclays raised their target price on AT&T from $24.00 to $27.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating, fourteen have given a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $25.83.

AT&T Trading Up 1.2 %

Shares of NYSE T opened at $22.30 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $159.97 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.13, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.46 and a beta of 0.59. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.09, a current ratio of 0.73 and a quick ratio of 0.67. AT&T Inc. has a 1 year low of $15.94 and a 1 year high of $24.03. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $22.79 and a 200 day moving average of $21.35.

AT&T (NYSE:T) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 23rd. The technology company reported $0.60 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.57 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $30.20 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $30.50 billion. AT&T had a return on equity of 13.97% and a net margin of 7.42%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down .5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.64 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that AT&T Inc. will post 2.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

AT&T Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, February 3rd. Investors of record on Friday, January 10th will be paid a $0.2775 dividend. This represents a $1.11 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.98%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 10th. AT&T’s payout ratio is 90.24%.

AT&T Profile

AT&T, Inc is a holding company, which engages in the provision of telecommunications and technology services. It operates through the Communications and Latin America segments. The Communications segment offers wireless, wireline telecom, and broadband services to businesses and consumers located in the US and businesses globally.