Barclays PLC Buys 129,934 Shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

Barclays PLC increased its stake in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 38.5% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 467,148 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 129,934 shares during the period. Barclays PLC’s holdings in TELUS were worth $7,839,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio purchased a new position in shares of TELUS during the third quarter worth approximately $1,509,000. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC grew its holdings in shares of TELUS by 25.6% during the 3rd quarter. Orion Portfolio Solutions LLC now owns 15,270 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $256,000 after purchasing an additional 3,110 shares during the last quarter. National Bank of Canada FI grew its holdings in shares of TELUS by 24.2% during the 3rd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 26,160,789 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $438,922,000 after purchasing an additional 5,094,269 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its stake in TELUS by 69.2% in the third quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 256,506 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $4,308,000 after purchasing an additional 104,939 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Polar Asset Management Partners Inc. boosted its position in TELUS by 34.0% during the third quarter. Polar Asset Management Partners Inc. now owns 81,665 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $1,370,000 after buying an additional 20,728 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 49.40% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently commented on TU. Scotiabank upgraded TELUS from a “sector perform” rating to a “sector outperform” rating in a report on Monday, October 28th. StockNews.com downgraded TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 21st. National Bank Financial cut shares of TELUS from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Finally, Morgan Stanley initiated coverage on shares of TELUS in a report on Monday. They issued an “equal weight” rating on the stock. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $26.00.

TELUS Stock Performance

Shares of TU stock opened at $14.05 on Wednesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.89, a PEG ratio of 2.10 and a beta of 0.73. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $15.62 and a 200 day moving average of $15.94. TELUS Co. has a 52 week low of $14.00 and a 52 week high of $18.55. The company has a quick ratio of 0.63, a current ratio of 0.69 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last posted its earnings results on Friday, November 8th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.28 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.17 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $5.10 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $3.69 billion. TELUS had a net margin of 4.56% and a return on equity of 8.80%. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.19 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 1.8% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts expect that TELUS Co. will post 0.73 earnings per share for the current year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 2nd. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, December 11th will be given a dividend of $0.297 per share. This represents a $1.19 annualized dividend and a yield of 8.46%. This is a boost from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, December 11th. TELUS’s payout ratio is presently 253.19%.

TELUS Company Profile

TELUS Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides a range of telecommunications and information technology products and services in Canada. It operates through Technology Solutions and Digitally-Led Customer Experiences segments. The Technology Solutions segment offers a range of telecommunications products and services; network services; healthcare services; mobile technologies equipment; data services, such as internet protocol; television; hosting, managed information technology, and cloud-based services; software, data management, and data analytics-driven smart food-chain and consumer goods technologies; home and business security; healthcare software and technology solutions; and voice and other telecommunications services, as well as mobile and fixed voice and data telecommunications services and products.