Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) Receives C$74.85 Consensus Target Price from Brokerages

Shares of Fortis Inc. (TSE:FTS) have received an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the nine brokerages that are presently covering the stock, Marketbeat.com reports. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, three have assigned a buy recommendation and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year target price among analysts that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is C$74.65.

FTS has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Scotiabank lifted their price objective on shares of Fortis from C$74.00 to C$79.00 in a report on Tuesday, December 16th. Royal Bank Of Canada raised their price target on shares of Fortis from C$72.00 to C$79.00 in a research report on Wednesday, November 5th. Jefferies Financial Group lowered their price objective on Fortis from C$72.00 to C$70.00 in a research note on Wednesday. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on Fortis from C$72.00 to C$74.00 in a report on Wednesday, November 5th. Finally, Raymond James Financial upped their price target on Fortis from C$72.00 to C$75.50 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, October 24th.

Fortis Trading Up 0.4%

FTS opened at C$72.60 on Friday. Fortis has a twelve month low of C$60.50 and a twelve month high of C$74.00. The company has a fifty day moving average of C$71.49 and a 200-day moving average of C$70.30. The stock has a market cap of C$36.42 billion, a PE ratio of 21.61, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.01 and a beta of 0.31. The company has a quick ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 142.31.

Fortis (TSE:FTS) last issued its earnings results on Tuesday, November 4th. The company reported C$0.87 earnings per share for the quarter. Fortis had a return on equity of 7.48% and a net margin of 14.53%.The business had revenue of C$2.94 billion during the quarter. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Fortis will post 3.3419913 EPS for the current year.

Fortis Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, December 1st. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 1st were given a $0.64 dividend. This is an increase from Fortis’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.62. This represents a $2.56 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.5%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, November 17th. Fortis’s payout ratio is presently 73.21%.

About Fortis

Fortis owns and operates 10 utility transmission and distribution assets in Canada and the United States, serving more than 3.4 million electricity and gas customers. The company has smaller stakes in electricity generation and several Caribbean utilities. ITC operates electric transmission in seven U.S. states, with more than 16,000 miles of high-voltage transmission lines in operation serving a peak load in excess of 23 gigawatts.