Legal & General Group Plc Buys 361,980 Shares of Xcel Energy Inc. $XEL

Legal & General Group Plc raised its stake in shares of Xcel Energy Inc. (NASDAQ:XEL) by 6.4% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 6,014,053 shares of the company’s stock after purchasing an additional 361,980 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc’s holdings in Xcel Energy were worth $485,033,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in XEL. ORG Partners LLC increased its holdings in shares of Xcel Energy by 168.4% in the third quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 314 shares of the company’s stock worth $25,000 after purchasing an additional 197 shares during the last quarter. Twin Peaks Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Xcel Energy in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $25,000. First Command Advisory Services Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Xcel Energy during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $32,000. Clearstead Trust LLC boosted its position in shares of Xcel Energy by 202.2% during the 2nd quarter. Clearstead Trust LLC now owns 417 shares of the company’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 279 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Collier Financial purchased a new position in shares of Xcel Energy in the third quarter valued at $38,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 78.38% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price target on shares of Xcel Energy from $90.00 to $87.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, December 11th. Argus upgraded shares of Xcel Energy to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 3rd. Mizuho set a $86.00 price target on shares of Xcel Energy in a report on Friday, January 9th. Weiss Ratings lowered Xcel Energy from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 5th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $95.00 price objective on shares of Xcel Energy in a research report on Friday, January 23rd. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twelve have issued a Buy rating, one has issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $88.60.

Xcel Energy Stock Down 0.3%

Shares of XEL stock opened at $81.88 on Wednesday. Xcel Energy Inc. has a 1-year low of $65.21 and a 1-year high of $84.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.35, a current ratio of 0.71 and a quick ratio of 0.60. The company has a market cap of $51.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.94, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.25 and a beta of 0.45. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $77.98 and its 200 day moving average price is $77.58.

Xcel Energy (NASDAQ:XEL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The company reported $0.96 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.96. The business had revenue of $3.56 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.77 billion. Xcel Energy had a return on equity of 10.46% and a net margin of 13.76%.The company’s quarterly revenue was up 14.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.81 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Xcel Energy Inc. will post 3.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Xcel Energy Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 20th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be issued a $0.5925 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 13th. This is an increase from Xcel Energy’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.57. This represents a $2.37 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.9%. Xcel Energy’s dividend payout ratio is 66.67%.

About Xcel Energy

Xcel Energy (NASDAQ: XEL) is a Minneapolis-based, publicly traded utility holding company that develops, owns and operates regulated electricity and natural gas delivery systems. The company’s core activities include generation, transmission and distribution of electricity, the delivery of natural gas to customers, and related customer service operations. Xcel provides a mix of utility services to residential, commercial and industrial customers and participates in wholesale energy markets where appropriate.

Its generation portfolio combines nuclear, natural gas, coal and a growing share of renewable resources such as wind and solar.