Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) Holdings Raised by Great Valley Advisor Group Inc.

Great Valley Advisor Group Inc. increased its stake in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) by 17.2% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 126,435 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock after buying an additional 18,549 shares during the quarter. Great Valley Advisor Group Inc.’s holdings in Halliburton were worth $3,438,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Halliburton during the 4th quarter valued at $299,986,000. Amundi boosted its stake in Halliburton by 22.2% during the fourth quarter. Amundi now owns 13,068,025 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $353,242,000 after buying an additional 2,378,043 shares in the last quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC grew its holdings in Halliburton by 15.6% during the fourth quarter. Barrow Hanley Mewhinney & Strauss LLC now owns 16,093,680 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $437,587,000 after acquiring an additional 2,171,722 shares during the period. Pacer Advisors Inc. grew its holdings in Halliburton by 10.4% during the fourth quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 18,530,937 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $503,856,000 after acquiring an additional 1,748,763 shares during the period. Finally, Twinbeech Capital LP raised its position in Halliburton by 314.1% in the fourth quarter. Twinbeech Capital LP now owns 2,044,661 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $55,594,000 after acquiring an additional 1,550,920 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 85.23% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Halliburton

In other news, Director Margaret Katherine Banks sold 3,900 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $24.04, for a total transaction of $93,756.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 10,551 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $253,646.04. This trade represents a 26.99% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, VP Timothy Mckeon sold 10,497 shares of Halliburton stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $24.60, for a total value of $258,226.20. Following the sale, the vice president now owns 77,784 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,913,486.40. This represents a 11.89% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 65,576 shares of company stock valued at $1,631,457 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.56% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently weighed in on HAL. The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $27.00 to $24.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Morgan Stanley reduced their target price on shares of Halliburton from $34.00 to $28.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, May 16th. Citigroup decreased their price target on shares of Halliburton from $33.00 to $31.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 24th. UBS Group cut their price objective on Halliburton from $23.00 to $22.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 24th. Finally, Barclays reduced their price objective on Halliburton from $29.00 to $26.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and fourteen have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Halliburton presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $33.53.

Halliburton Trading Down 0.3%

NYSE:HAL opened at $19.91 on Tuesday. The stock has a market cap of $17.12 billion, a PE ratio of 7.04, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.79 and a beta of 1.19. Halliburton has a fifty-two week low of $18.72 and a fifty-two week high of $37.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a current ratio of 2.05 and a quick ratio of 1.54. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $21.63 and its two-hundred day moving average is $25.53.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 22nd. The oilfield services company reported $0.60 EPS for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of $0.60. Halliburton had a net margin of 10.90% and a return on equity of 26.03%. The business had revenue of $5.42 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $5.28 billion. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Halliburton will post 2.64 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Halliburton Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, June 25th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, June 4th will be paid a dividend of $0.17 per share. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.42%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, June 4th. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 28.45%.

Halliburton Profile

Halliburton Company provides products and services to the energy industry worldwide. It operates through two segments, Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. The Completion and Production segment offers production enhancement services that include stimulation and sand control services; cementing services, such as well bonding and casing, and casing equipment; and completion tools that offer downhole solutions and services, including well completion products and services, intelligent well completions, and service tools, as well as liner hanger, sand control, and multilateral systems.