Short Interest in Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) Increases By 11.1%

Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) was the recipient of a large increase in short interest in March. As of March 31st, there was short interest totalling 8,810,000 shares, an increase of 11.1% from the March 15th total of 7,930,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 863,700 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 10.2 days.

Fortis Trading Down 1.1 %

NYSE:FTS opened at $37.14 on Wednesday. Fortis has a 12-month low of $36.30 and a 12-month high of $46.28. The firm has a market capitalization of $18.31 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.15, a P/E/G ratio of 2.63 and a beta of 0.42. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.27, a current ratio of 0.67 and a quick ratio of 0.58. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $39.14 and a 200 day simple moving average of $39.96.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last released its quarterly earnings data on Friday, February 9th. The utilities provider reported $0.53 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.52 by $0.01. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.00% and a net margin of 13.22%. The business had revenue of $2.12 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.39 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.53 EPS. Equities research analysts predict that Fortis will post 2.39 EPS for the current year.

Fortis Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Saturday, June 1st. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be paid a dividend of $0.4382 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 16th. This represents a $1.75 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.72%. This is an increase from Fortis’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.44. Fortis’s payout ratio is presently 76.09%.

Institutional Trading of Fortis

Several hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in FTS. Invesco Ltd. raised its stake in shares of Fortis by 8.4% in the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 1,845,400 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $70,107,000 after buying an additional 142,731 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of Fortis by 1.9% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 19,421,010 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $737,804,000 after buying an additional 353,112 shares in the last quarter. QV Investors Inc. raised its stake in shares of Fortis by 18.1% in the 4th quarter. QV Investors Inc. now owns 1,016,319 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $42,014,000 after buying an additional 155,821 shares in the last quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Fortis by 32.4% in the 3rd quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 158,635 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $6,027,000 after acquiring an additional 38,803 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc grew its holdings in shares of Fortis by 1.7% in the 3rd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 5,410,825 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $206,425,000 after acquiring an additional 90,274 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 57.77% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Separately, StockNews.com lowered Fortis from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $55.13.

About Fortis

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.