Millstone Evans Group LLC Takes Position in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ)

Millstone Evans Group LLC acquired a new stake in Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor acquired 12,474 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock, valued at approximately $499,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in VZ. Swedbank AB grew its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 0.8% in the third quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 5,174,541 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $232,389,000 after buying an additional 39,403 shares in the last quarter. Segall Bryant & Hamill LLC bought a new position in shares of Verizon Communications in the third quarter valued at $2,790,000. King Luther Capital Management Corp grew its stake in shares of Verizon Communications by 13.5% in the third quarter. King Luther Capital Management Corp now owns 199,685 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock valued at $8,968,000 after buying an additional 23,711 shares in the last quarter. Landscape Capital Management L.L.C. bought a new position in Verizon Communications during the third quarter worth $880,000. Finally, LPL Financial LLC boosted its position in Verizon Communications by 6.5% during the third quarter. LPL Financial LLC now owns 7,488,172 shares of the cell phone carrier’s stock worth $336,294,000 after purchasing an additional 458,021 shares during the period. 62.06% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have commented on the stock. Wolfe Research cut shares of Verizon Communications from an “outperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, March 12th. StockNews.com cut shares of Verizon Communications from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 13th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their price objective on shares of Verizon Communications from $40.00 to $42.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, January 24th. TD Cowen raised shares of Verizon Communications to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 15th. Finally, DZ Bank raised shares of Verizon Communications from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $40.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Wednesday, January 29th. Eleven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have given a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $46.11.

Verizon Communications Stock Up 0.7 %

VZ stock opened at $44.06 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $185.46 billion, a PE ratio of 10.64, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.45 and a beta of 0.41. The business has a 50-day simple moving average of $41.52 and a 200 day simple moving average of $42.01. Verizon Communications Inc. has a 52 week low of $37.59 and a 52 week high of $47.36. The company has a quick ratio of 0.59, a current ratio of 0.63 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.21.

Verizon Communications (NYSE:VZ) last issued its earnings results on Friday, January 24th. The cell phone carrier reported $1.10 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.11 by ($0.01). Verizon Communications had a return on equity of 19.80% and a net margin of 12.99%. During the same period last year, the company posted $1.08 EPS. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Verizon Communications Inc. will post 4.69 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Verizon Communications Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, May 1st. Shareholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a dividend of $0.6775 per share. This represents a $2.71 annualized dividend and a yield of 6.15%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 10th. Verizon Communications’s payout ratio is 65.46%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Verizon Communications news, CEO Kyle Malady sold 8,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $39.88, for a total transaction of $319,040.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 6,590 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $262,809.20. The trade was a 54.83 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, EVP Vandana Venkatesh sold 10,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $43.79, for a total value of $437,900.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 14,459 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $633,159.61. The trade was a 40.88 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 49,085 shares of company stock valued at $2,020,895. 0.02% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Verizon Communications

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).