Stock Traders Buy High Volume of Call Options on Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE:PAA)

Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. (NYSE:PAA) was the target of some unusual options trading activity on Wednesday. Stock traders acquired 9,116 call options on the company. This is an increase of approximately 251% compared to the typical volume of 2,594 call options.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Plains All American Pipeline

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of PAA. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its stake in shares of Plains All American Pipeline by 58.9% during the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 7,221,571 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $125,439,000 after acquiring an additional 2,677,951 shares during the last quarter. Citigroup Inc. raised its stake in shares of Plains All American Pipeline by 48.9% during the third quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 3,428,897 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $59,560,000 after acquiring an additional 1,125,386 shares during the last quarter. Kovitz Investment Group Partners LLC bought a new position in shares of Plains All American Pipeline during the third quarter valued at about $11,634,000. CUSHING ASSET MANAGEMENT LP dba NXG INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT raised its stake in shares of Plains All American Pipeline by 241.0% during the third quarter. CUSHING ASSET MANAGEMENT LP dba NXG INVESTMENT MANAGEMENT now owns 449,827 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $7,813,000 after acquiring an additional 317,927 shares during the last quarter. Finally, ING Groep NV raised its stake in shares of Plains All American Pipeline by 29.1% during the third quarter. ING Groep NV now owns 1,321,937 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $22,962,000 after acquiring an additional 297,937 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 41.78% of the company’s stock.

Plains All American Pipeline Stock Up 6.2 %

Shares of NYSE:PAA opened at $18.73 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $13.18 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.72 and a beta of 1.64. The company has a quick ratio of 0.92, a current ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.64. Plains All American Pipeline has a 12-month low of $15.02 and a 12-month high of $19.17. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $17.48 and a 200 day simple moving average of $17.66.

Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE:PAA) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Friday, November 8th. The pipeline company reported $0.37 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.31 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $12.74 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.09 billion. Plains All American Pipeline had a return on equity of 11.63% and a net margin of 2.08%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.35 EPS. Analysts predict that Plains All American Pipeline will post 1.24 earnings per share for the current year.

Plains All American Pipeline Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Friday, January 31st will be issued a $0.38 dividend. This represents a $1.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 8.12%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 31st. This is a boost from Plains All American Pipeline’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.32. Plains All American Pipeline’s payout ratio is 113.39%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have issued reports on the stock. Bank of America initiated coverage on shares of Plains All American Pipeline in a report on Thursday, October 17th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $18.00 price objective on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lowered Plains All American Pipeline from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and dropped their price objective for the company from $22.00 to $20.00 in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Morgan Stanley lowered Plains All American Pipeline from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $22.00 to $19.00 in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada restated a “sector perform” rating and set a $19.00 price objective on shares of Plains All American Pipeline in a research note on Friday, November 15th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Plains All American Pipeline has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $19.82.

Plains All American Pipeline Company Profile

Plains All American Pipeline, L.P., through its subsidiaries, engages in the pipeline transportation, terminaling, storage, and gathering of crude oil and natural gas liquids (NGL) in the United States and Canada. The company operates through two segments, Crude Oil and NGL. The Crude Oil segment offers gathering and transporting crude oil through pipelines, gathering systems, trucks, and on barges or railcars.