Summit Trail Advisors LLC Buys 3,678 Shares of The Williams Companies, Inc. (NYSE:WMB)

Summit Trail Advisors LLC grew its stake in The Williams Companies, Inc. (NYSE:WMB) by 38.1% in the 2nd quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 13,324 shares of the pipeline company’s stock after buying an additional 3,678 shares during the quarter. Summit Trail Advisors LLC’s holdings in Williams Companies were worth $566,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other large investors also recently made changes to their positions in WMB. Clearbridge Investments LLC boosted its stake in Williams Companies by 5.9% in the 1st quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 20,983,727 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $817,736,000 after purchasing an additional 1,175,628 shares during the period. Tortoise Capital Advisors L.L.C. lifted its holdings in shares of Williams Companies by 1.2% in the second quarter. Tortoise Capital Advisors L.L.C. now owns 12,670,175 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $538,482,000 after purchasing an additional 144,713 shares in the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP boosted its position in shares of Williams Companies by 21.3% during the fourth quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 11,593,482 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $403,801,000 after buying an additional 2,039,703 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP grew its holdings in shares of Williams Companies by 3.3% during the second quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 9,648,918 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $410,064,000 after buying an additional 311,530 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors LP raised its position in Williams Companies by 13.4% in the 1st quarter. Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors LP now owns 8,540,611 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $332,828,000 after buying an additional 1,010,658 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 86.44% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have weighed in on WMB shares. Scotiabank upped their price target on Williams Companies from $43.00 to $48.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 8th. Barclays raised their target price on shares of Williams Companies from $41.00 to $42.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday, August 19th. StockNews.com cut shares of Williams Companies from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 6th. Wells Fargo & Company upgraded Williams Companies from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $38.00 to $46.00 in a report on Tuesday, June 4th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their target price on Williams Companies from $51.00 to $55.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, September 18th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, Williams Companies has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $43.50.

Williams Companies Stock Up 1.1 %

WMB opened at $45.38 on Monday. The company has a current ratio of 0.45, a quick ratio of 0.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.64. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $44.06 and its 200 day simple moving average is $41.38. The Williams Companies, Inc. has a 1-year low of $32.49 and a 1-year high of $45.82. The stock has a market cap of $55.31 billion, a PE ratio of 19.07, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 6.24 and a beta of 1.05.

Williams Companies (NYSE:WMB) last posted its earnings results on Monday, August 5th. The pipeline company reported $0.43 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.38 by $0.05. Williams Companies had a net margin of 27.11% and a return on equity of 16.17%. The company had revenue of $2.34 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.46 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.42 EPS. Williams Companies’s quarterly revenue was down 5.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts expect that The Williams Companies, Inc. will post 1.93 earnings per share for the current year.

Williams Companies Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, September 30th. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 13th will be given a $0.475 dividend. This represents a $1.90 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.19%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, September 13th. Williams Companies’s payout ratio is 79.83%.

About Williams Companies

The Williams Companies, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as an energy infrastructure company primarily in the United States. It operates through Transmission & Gulf of Mexico, Northeast G&P, West, and Gas & NGL Marketing Services segments. The Transmission & Gulf of Mexico segment comprises natural gas pipelines; Transco, Northwest pipeline, MountainWest, and related natural gas storage facilities; and natural gas gathering and processing, and crude oil production handling and transportation assets in the Gulf Coast region.