Sei Investments Co. Acquires 14,427 Shares of NorthWestern Corporation $NWE

Sei Investments Co. increased its holdings in shares of NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ:NWE) by 34.4% in the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 56,426 shares of the company’s stock after acquiring an additional 14,427 shares during the period. Sei Investments Co.’s holdings in NorthWestern were worth $3,721,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Cetera Investment Advisers boosted its stake in NorthWestern by 39.3% in the 1st quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 15,611 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,029,000 after purchasing an additional 4,403 shares during the period. Magellan Asset Management Ltd raised its position in shares of NorthWestern by 25.7% during the first quarter. Magellan Asset Management Ltd now owns 65,874 shares of the company’s stock valued at $4,344,000 after buying an additional 13,464 shares during the last quarter. Mathes Company Inc. raised its position in shares of NorthWestern by 2.9% during the first quarter. Mathes Company Inc. now owns 56,255 shares of the company’s stock valued at $3,709,000 after buying an additional 1,600 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 0.6% in the first quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 1,023,230 shares of the company’s stock worth $67,472,000 after buying an additional 5,815 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Swiss National Bank lifted its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 0.3% in the first quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 121,483 shares of the company’s stock worth $8,011,000 after buying an additional 400 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 96.07% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

NWE has been the subject of several research analyst reports. Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on shares of NorthWestern from $62.00 to $70.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, July 31st. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of NorthWestern to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, April 25th. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of NorthWestern from $62.00 to $75.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, April 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price objective on NorthWestern from $73.00 to $76.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 9th. Finally, Weiss Ratings cut NorthWestern from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a report on Thursday, July 30th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, NorthWestern has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $73.30.

NorthWestern Stock Up 1.6%

Shares of NASDAQ:NWE opened at $70.27 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $4.32 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.37, a PEG ratio of 3.66 and a beta of 0.34. NorthWestern Corporation has a 12 month low of $54.89 and a 12 month high of $75.18. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $70.81 and a 200 day moving average price of $69.87. The company has a current ratio of 0.83, a quick ratio of 0.58 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.19.

NorthWestern (NASDAQ:NWE) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, July 29th. The company reported $0.50 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.42 by $0.08. The business had revenue of $392.60 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $386.22 million. NorthWestern had a return on equity of 8.03% and a net margin of 10.13%.The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.40 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts predict that NorthWestern Corporation will post 3.75 earnings per share for the current year.

NorthWestern Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, August 17th will be paid a dividend of $0.67 per share. This represents a $2.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, August 17th. NorthWestern’s payout ratio is currently 96.75%.

NorthWestern Company Profile

NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ: NWE) is a regulated energy company that delivers electricity and natural gas to residential, commercial and industrial customers. Through its Electric Operations and Gas Operations segments, the company operates an extensive network of distribution lines, substations and pipelines. NorthWestern’s services encompass the delivery of power sourced from regional transmission systems and the procurement, storage and distribution of natural gas to end users.

Electric delivery services include the management of distribution infrastructure, customer metering and system reliability programs.