Wolfe Research Upgrades Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE:PAA) to Outperform

Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE:PAA) was upgraded by equities researchers at Wolfe Research from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report issued on Friday, Marketbeat.com reports. The brokerage presently has a $22.00 price target on the pipeline company’s stock. Wolfe Research’s price target would indicate a potential upside of 16.53% from the company’s previous close.

Other research analysts have also recently issued research reports about the company. Bank of America began coverage on Plains All American Pipeline in a research report on Thursday, October 17th. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $18.00 target price on the stock. Morgan Stanley cut Plains All American Pipeline from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $22.00 to $19.00 in a research report on Friday, October 25th. Wells Fargo & Company cut Plains All American Pipeline from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $22.00 to $20.00 in a research report on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reiterated a “sector perform” rating and issued a $19.00 target price on shares of Plains All American Pipeline in a research report on Friday, November 15th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $20.00.

Plains All American Pipeline Stock Performance

PAA opened at $18.88 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $13.29 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.86 and a beta of 1.64. Plains All American Pipeline has a 52-week low of $15.02 and a 52-week high of $19.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.64, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a current ratio of 1.01. The business’s fifty day moving average is $17.58 and its 200-day moving average is $17.68.

Plains All American Pipeline (NYSE:PAA) last released its earnings results on Friday, November 8th. The pipeline company reported $0.37 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.31 by $0.06. The company had revenue of $12.74 billion for 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%. Plains All American Pipeline’s quarterly revenue was up 5.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.35 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Plains All American Pipeline will post 1.24 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Plains All American Pipeline

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

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.