HighTower Advisors LLC Sells 3,854 Shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

HighTower Advisors LLC trimmed its position in shares of TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 24.8% during the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 11,671 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after selling 3,854 shares during the period. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in TELUS were worth $195,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of the company. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp raised its position in shares of TELUS by 132.4% during the 3rd quarter. BRITISH COLUMBIA INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT Corp now owns 479,785 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $8,048,000 after buying an additional 273,368 shares in the last quarter. Northwest & Ethical Investments L.P. increased its stake in TELUS by 0.5% during the third quarter. Northwest & Ethical Investments L.P. now owns 449,777 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $7,547,000 after acquiring an additional 2,196 shares during the last quarter. Public Sector Pension Investment Board raised its position in TELUS by 2.0% during the third quarter. Public Sector Pension Investment Board now owns 77,198 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $1,297,000 after purchasing an additional 1,500 shares during the period. BNP Paribas Financial Markets lifted its stake in shares of TELUS by 188.7% in the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 135,825 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $2,279,000 after purchasing an additional 88,771 shares during the last quarter. Finally, FMR LLC boosted its holdings in shares of TELUS by 192.0% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 1,326,632 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock worth $22,257,000 after purchasing an additional 872,235 shares during the period. 49.40% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts recently weighed in on the company. National Bank Financial lowered TELUS from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a report on Friday, December 13th. Morgan Stanley started coverage on shares of TELUS in a research note on Monday, December 16th. They issued an “equal weight” rating on the stock. StockNews.com lowered shares of TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Thursday, November 21st. Finally, Scotiabank upgraded shares of TELUS from a “sector perform” rating to a “sector outperform” rating in a report on Monday, October 28th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $26.00.

TELUS Price Performance

Shares of TU stock opened at $13.57 on Thursday. The company has a market capitalization of $20.36 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.87, a P/E/G ratio of 2.10 and a beta of 0.73. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is $15.39 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $15.84. TELUS Co. has a one year low of $13.54 and a one year high of $18.55. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.50, a current ratio of 0.69 and a quick ratio of 0.63.

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

TELUS Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 2nd. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, December 11th will be issued a $0.297 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, December 11th. This represents a $1.19 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 8.75%. This is a positive change from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28. TELUS’s payout ratio is currently 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.