Hancock Whitney Corporation $HWC Stake Increased by Stratos Wealth Partners LTD.

Stratos Wealth Partners LTD. increased its stake in Hancock Whitney Corporation (NASDAQ:HWC) by 84.3% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 25,837 shares of the company’s stock after buying an additional 11,819 shares during the period. Stratos Wealth Partners LTD.’s holdings in Hancock Whitney were worth $1,483,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Wellington Management Group LLP increased its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 50.4% in the first quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 3,057,103 shares of the company’s stock worth $160,345,000 after buying an additional 1,024,869 shares during the last quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 12.7% in the first quarter. Fuller & Thaler Asset Management Inc. now owns 2,089,454 shares of the company’s stock worth $109,592,000 after buying an additional 235,363 shares during the last quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC increased its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 6.8% in the first quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC now owns 2,027,364 shares of the company’s stock worth $105,139,000 after buying an additional 128,860 shares during the last quarter. American Century Companies Inc. increased its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 0.4% in the first quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,465,661 shares of the company’s stock worth $76,874,000 after buying an additional 6,315 shares during the last quarter. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Hancock Whitney by 1.1% in the first quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,335,997 shares of the company’s stock worth $69,044,000 after buying an additional 14,717 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 81.22% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently issued reports on HWC. Raymond James Financial dropped their price target on shares of Hancock Whitney from $73.00 to $72.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, October 15th. Citigroup boosted their target price on shares of Hancock Whitney from $70.00 to $74.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, August 26th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered shares of Hancock Whitney from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $62.00 to $63.00 in a research note on Friday, July 11th. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of Hancock Whitney in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, Piper Sandler boosted their target price on shares of Hancock Whitney from $70.00 to $72.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 16th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have issued a Buy rating and one has assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $69.86.

Insider Activity

In other news, CFO Michael M. Achary sold 9,894 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, October 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $54.86, for a total transaction of $542,784.84. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 55,733 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,057,512.38. The trade was a 15.08% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Company insiders own 0.91% of the company’s stock.

Hancock Whitney Stock Performance

Shares of HWC opened at $56.57 on Tuesday. Hancock Whitney Corporation has a 1 year low of $43.90 and a 1 year high of $64.66. The company has a market cap of $4.79 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.12 and a beta of 1.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.05, a quick ratio of 0.79 and a current ratio of 0.79. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $61.89 and a 200-day moving average of $57.66.

Hancock Whitney (NASDAQ:HWC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 14th. The company reported $1.49 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.43 by $0.06. Hancock Whitney had a net margin of 23.99% and a return on equity of 11.29%. The company had revenue of $0.03 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $391.32 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.33 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Hancock Whitney Corporation will post 5.53 earnings per share for the current year.

Hancock Whitney Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 5th were issued a dividend of $0.45 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 5th. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.2%. Hancock Whitney’s payout ratio is 32.20%.

Hancock Whitney Company Profile

Hancock Whitney Corporation operates as the financial holding company for Hancock Whitney Bank that provides traditional and online banking services to commercial, small business, and retail customers. It offers various transaction and savings deposit products consisting of brokered deposits, time deposits, and money market accounts; treasury management services, secured and unsecured loan products including revolving credit facilities, and letters of credit and similar financial guarantees; and trust and investment management services to retirement plans, corporations, and individuals, and investment advisory and brokerage products.