Caption Management LLC Acquires 60,044 Shares of TransAlta Corporation $TAC

Caption Management LLC grew its holdings in TransAlta Corporation (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) by 156.2% in the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm owned 98,493 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after buying an additional 60,044 shares during the quarter. Caption Management LLC’s holdings in TransAlta were worth $921,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Bank of America Corp DE raised its holdings in shares of TransAlta by 280.1% during the fourth quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 5,385,966 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $76,211,000 after acquiring an additional 3,969,037 shares in the last quarter. Potrero Capital Research LLC increased its position in TransAlta by 373.2% during the 4th quarter. Potrero Capital Research LLC now owns 2,323,944 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $32,884,000 after purchasing an additional 1,832,803 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. increased its position in TransAlta by 1,150.1% during the 1st quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 904,342 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $8,456,000 after purchasing an additional 832,000 shares during the period. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp raised its holdings in TransAlta by 491.9% in the 1st quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 697,393 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $6,510,000 after purchasing an additional 579,577 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board purchased a new stake in shares of TransAlta in the 1st quarter worth about $4,200,000. 59.00% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently issued reports on TAC. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of TransAlta from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, June 14th. Scotiabank raised TransAlta from a “sector perform” rating to a “sector outperform” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $16.00 to $20.00 in a research report on Friday, July 18th. National Bankshares reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of TransAlta in a research report on Tuesday, August 5th. Royal Bank Of Canada lowered their target price on TransAlta from $23.00 to $20.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, May 8th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group raised TransAlta from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, June 12th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, five have issued a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $19.88.

TransAlta Price Performance

TAC stock opened at $12.30 on Monday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $11.80 and a 200-day moving average price of $10.34. TransAlta Corporation has a 52-week low of $7.82 and a 52-week high of $14.64. The firm has a market capitalization of $3.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -29.27 and a beta of 0.78. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.98, a quick ratio of 0.72 and a current ratio of 0.79.

TransAlta (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 1st. The utilities provider reported $0.13 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.07 by $0.06. TransAlta had a negative return on equity of 2.06% and a negative net margin of 6.79%.The company had revenue of $451.20 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $473.94 million. Equities research analysts forecast that TransAlta Corporation will post 0.41 EPS for the current fiscal year.

TransAlta Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, October 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 1st will be issued a dividend of $0.065 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, August 29th. This is a boost from TransAlta’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.05. This represents a $0.26 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.1%. TransAlta’s dividend payout ratio is -45.24%.

TransAlta Company Profile

TransAlta Corporation engages in the development, production, and sale of electric energy. It operates through Hydro, Wind and Solar, Gas, Energy Transition, and Energy Marketing segments. The Hydro segment holds interest of approximately 922 megawatts (MW) of owned hydroelectric generating capacity located in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario.