Short Interest in TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) Grows By 50.6%

TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) was the recipient of a significant growth in short interest in the month of February. As of February 28th, there was short interest totalling 15,120,000 shares, a growth of 50.6% from the February 13th total of 10,040,000 shares. Approximately 5.1% of the shares of the company are sold short. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 1,930,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 7.8 days.

Institutional Trading of TransAlta

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of TAC. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its holdings in shares of TransAlta by 1.5% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 10,229,823 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $144,680,000 after purchasing an additional 150,554 shares in the last quarter. Bank of Montreal Can grew its position in TransAlta by 8.4% in the fourth quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 9,290,110 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $131,222,000 after buying an additional 716,139 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its holdings in shares of TransAlta by 79.7% in the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 8,255,923 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $116,764,000 after buying an additional 3,662,900 shares in the last quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. lifted its position in shares of TransAlta by 638.9% during the 4th quarter. Connor Clark & Lunn Investment Management Ltd. now owns 7,995,489 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $112,936,000 after acquiring an additional 6,913,431 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Rubric Capital Management LP boosted its stake in shares of TransAlta by 20.0% during the 3rd quarter. Rubric Capital Management LP now owns 5,622,961 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $58,254,000 after acquiring an additional 935,803 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 59.00% of the company’s stock.

TransAlta Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE TAC traded up $0.16 during midday trading on Monday, reaching $9.69. 1,495,126 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 2,153,162. The company has a market cap of $2.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 23.62 and a beta of 0.89. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $11.36 and a 200 day moving average price of $11.15. TransAlta has a 52 week low of $5.94 and a 52 week high of $14.64. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.94, a current ratio of 0.74 and a quick ratio of 0.67.

TransAlta (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 20th. The utilities provider reported ($0.16) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.12 by ($0.28). The company had revenue of $484.60 million during the quarter. TransAlta had a return on equity of 18.47% and a net margin of 6.38%. Sell-side analysts anticipate that TransAlta will post 0.41 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

TransAlta Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, July 1st. Shareholders of record on Sunday, June 1st will be paid a dividend of $0.0458 per share. This is a positive change from TransAlta’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.04. This represents a $0.18 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.89%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 30th. TransAlta’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 43.90%.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on TAC shares. StockNews.com downgraded shares of TransAlta from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 21st. Cibc World Mkts raised shares of TransAlta from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 18th. CIBC upgraded shares of TransAlta from a “neutral” rating to an “outperformer” rating and dropped their price target for the company from $23.00 to $19.50 in a research note on Tuesday, February 18th. Finally, Scotiabank downgraded TransAlta from a “sector outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 23rd. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, TransAlta has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $19.50.

TransAlta Company Profile

TransAlta Corporation engages in the development, production, and sale of electric energy. It operates through Hydro, Wind and Solar, Gas, Energy Transition, and Energy Marketing segments. The Hydro segment holds interest of approximately 922 megawatts (MW) of owned hydroelectric generating capacity located in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario.