Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) Cut to Hold at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen lowered shares of Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a research note released on Saturday morning.

BKR has been the subject of several other research reports. Piper Sandler increased their price target on Baker Hughes from $52.00 to $61.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 28th. iA Financial set a $60.00 price objective on Baker Hughes in a research note on Tuesday, January 27th. Evercore restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $68.00 target price on shares of Baker Hughes in a report on Wednesday, February 11th. Susquehanna raised their target price on Baker Hughes from $58.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a “positive” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 27th. Finally, Citigroup lifted their price target on Baker Hughes from $61.00 to $64.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 27th. Twenty analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Baker Hughes currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $59.61.

Baker Hughes Stock Performance

BKR opened at $60.68 on Friday. Baker Hughes has a twelve month low of $33.60 and a twelve month high of $67.00. The firm has a market capitalization of $59.97 billion, a PE ratio of 23.34, a PEG ratio of 1.71 and a beta of 0.83. The company has a current ratio of 1.36, a quick ratio of 1.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $59.62 and its 200 day moving average price is $51.98.

Baker Hughes (NASDAQ:BKR) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, January 26th. The company reported $0.78 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.67 by $0.11. The company had revenue of $7.39 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $7.09 billion. Baker Hughes had a net margin of 9.33% and a return on equity of 14.26%. Baker Hughes’s quarterly revenue was up .3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.70 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Baker Hughes will post 2.59 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Baker Hughes Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 27th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 17th were paid a $0.23 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 17th. This represents a $0.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.5%. Baker Hughes’s payout ratio is presently 35.38%.

Insider Transactions at Baker Hughes

In related news, CAO Rebecca L. Charlton sold 843 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $56.34, for a total transaction of $47,494.62. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 14,019 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $789,830.46. This represents a 5.67% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO Lorenzo Simonelli sold 272,594 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $58.79, for a total value of $16,025,801.26. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 866,444 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $50,938,242.76. This trade represents a 23.93% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 590,251 shares of company stock worth $35,311,023 over the last quarter. 0.27% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in BKR. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in Baker Hughes by 0.5% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 123,890,075 shares of the company’s stock valued at $6,035,924,000 after buying an additional 598,159 shares during the period. State Street Corp grew its stake in shares of Baker Hughes by 1.6% in the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 61,409,438 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,796,586,000 after acquiring an additional 937,614 shares in the last quarter. Cardano Risk Management B.V. increased its position in shares of Baker Hughes by 1,005.1% during the fourth quarter. Cardano Risk Management B.V. now owns 49,353,310 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,247,550,000 after acquiring an additional 44,887,481 shares during the period. Capital World Investors increased its position in shares of Baker Hughes by 7.1% during the third quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 47,546,388 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,316,462,000 after acquiring an additional 3,153,709 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of Baker Hughes by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 26,213,363 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,189,194,000 after acquiring an additional 204,534 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 92.06% of the company’s stock.

About Baker Hughes

Baker Hughes is an energy technology company that provides a broad portfolio of products, services and digital solutions for the oil and gas and industrial markets. Its offerings span oilfield services and equipment — including drilling, evaluation, completion and production technologies — as well as turbomachinery, compressors and related process equipment used in midstream and downstream operations. The company also supplies aftermarket services, field support and integrated solutions designed to improve asset performance and uptime across the energy value chain.

The firm’s roots trace back to the merger of Baker International and Hughes Tool Company, and more recently it combined with GE’s oil and gas business in 2017 to form Baker Hughes, a GE company (BHGE); subsequent changes in ownership restored Baker Hughes as an independent publicly traded company.