BP p.l.c. (NYSE:BP) Receives Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from Brokerages

Shares of BP p.l.c. (NYSE:BP) have earned an average rating of “Moderate Buy” from the eighteen research firms that are currently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have issued a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and three have issued a strong buy rating on the company. The average twelve-month target price among brokerages that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $42.0455.

BP has been the topic of several research analyst reports. BNP Paribas upgraded shares of BP from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, September 15th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on shares of BP from $35.00 to $38.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, August 18th. Raymond James Financial lifted their price target on shares of BP from $36.00 to $40.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 25th. Weiss Ratings restated a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of BP in a research note on Saturday, September 27th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of BP from $27.00 to $32.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, June 26th.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Bank of New York Mellon Corp lifted its holdings in shares of BP by 486.9% in the first quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 2,787,644 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $94,195,000 after purchasing an additional 2,312,687 shares in the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its stake in shares of BP by 5,751.4% during the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 207,606 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $7,015,000 after buying an additional 204,058 shares during the period. Baird Financial Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of BP by 206.0% during the second quarter. Baird Financial Group Inc. now owns 252,849 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock valued at $7,568,000 after buying an additional 170,221 shares during the period. Teachers Retirement System of The State of Kentucky increased its position in BP by 30.2% during the first quarter. Teachers Retirement System of The State of Kentucky now owns 444,530 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $15,020,000 after purchasing an additional 103,100 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Meritage Portfolio Management increased its position in BP by 54.7% during the first quarter. Meritage Portfolio Management now owns 163,147 shares of the oil and gas exploration company’s stock worth $5,513,000 after purchasing an additional 57,719 shares during the last quarter. 11.01% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

BP Price Performance

BP stock opened at $34.16 on Friday. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $34.20 and a 200-day simple moving average of $31.60. BP has a 12-month low of $25.22 and a 12-month high of $35.88. The company has a current ratio of 1.21, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. The stock has a market cap of $89.97 billion, a P/E ratio of 162.68, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.01 and a beta of 0.54.

BP (NYSE:BP) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 5th. The oil and gas exploration company reported $0.90 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.68 by $0.22. BP had a net margin of 0.29% and a return on equity of 9.08%. The firm had revenue of $46.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $42.88 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.00 EPS. BP’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities analysts expect that BP will post 3.53 EPS for the current fiscal year.

BP Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 19th. Shareholders of record on Friday, August 15th were paid a $0.4942 dividend. This is a boost from BP’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.48. This represents a $1.98 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 5.8%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 15th. BP’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 942.86%.

About BP

BP p.l.c. provides carbon products and services. The company operates through Gas & Low Carbon Energy, Oil Production & Operations, and Customers & Products segments. It engages in the production of natural gas, and integrated gas and power; trading of gas; operation of onshore and offshore wind power, as well as hydrogen and carbon capture and storage facilities; trading and marketing of renewable and non-renewable power; and production of crude oil.