California Water Service Group (NYSE:CWT) Stock Rating Upgraded by Freedom Broker

Key Points

• Freedom Broker upgraded California Water Service Group to “hold”, joining other analysts in a consensus “Hold” rating with an average target price of $54.00.
• CWT shares opened at $45.95 and were down 0.3%; the company recently exceeded quarterly expectations, reporting $0.93 in EPS on $308.6 million in revenue, with revenue rising 16.5% year over year.
• Institutional investors own 82.78% of the stock, while two directors recently sold shares; major new positions included BlackRock, Nuance Investments and Legal & General.

California Water Service Group (NYSE:CWT - Get Free Report) was upgraded by stock analysts at Freedom Broker to a "hold" rating in a research report issued on Wednesday, Zacks reports.

CWT has been the topic of several other research reports. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of California Water Service Group from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Saturday, July 18th. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of California Water Service Group from a "hold (c)" rating to a "hold (c+)" rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 4th. Finally, Seaport Research Partners restated a "buy" rating and set a $53.00 target price on shares of California Water Service Group in a research note on Wednesday, August 12th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Hold rating, Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $54.00.

California Water Service Group Trading Down 0.3%

Shares of California Water Service Group stock opened at $45.95 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 0.70 and a quick ratio of 0.67. California Water Service Group has a 1 year low of $41.29 and a 1 year high of $53.82. The firm has a market cap of $2.84 billion, a PE ratio of 20.70, a PEG ratio of 1.68 and a beta of 0.50. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $49.69 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $47.09.

California Water Service Group (NYSE:CWT - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 30th. The utilities provider reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.80 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $308.60 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $283.50 million. California Water Service Group had a return on equity of 7.74% and a net margin of 12.63%.The company's revenue was up 16.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.71 EPS. Analysts expect that California Water Service Group will post 2.57 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Transactions at California Water Service Group

In other California Water Service Group news, Director Thomas M. Krummel sold 3,700 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, August 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.37, for a total transaction of $186,369.00. Following the transaction, the director owned 20,104 shares in the company, valued at $1,012,638.48. The trade was a 15.54% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Lester A. Snow sold 500 shares of the company's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $50.21, for a total transaction of $25,105.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director directly owned 17,817 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $894,591.57. This represents a 2.73% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. 0.78% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in CWT. BlackRock Inc. bought a new stake in California Water Service Group in the second quarter worth $523,255,000. Nuance Investments LLC purchased a new position in California Water Service Group during the second quarter worth $53,324,000. Legal & General Group Plc bought a new position in California Water Service Group during the second quarter valued at $39,285,000. Amundi increased its position in California Water Service Group by 26.7% during the first quarter. Amundi now owns 3,470,997 shares of the utilities provider's stock valued at $157,421,000 after acquiring an additional 732,004 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Bank of New York Mellon Corp purchased a new stake in shares of California Water Service Group in the second quarter valued at $25,642,000. Institutional investors own 82.78% of the company's stock.

About California Water Service Group

California Water Service Group NYSE: CWT is a water utility holding company that provides regulated water service to residential, commercial, industrial and public-sector customers. Its operating companies collect, treat, test and distribute drinking water through local water systems, while also maintaining the wells, reservoirs, treatment facilities, pipelines and other infrastructure needed to deliver reliable service.

The company operates primarily through California Water Service Company, along with subsidiaries serving customers in Hawaii, New Mexico and Washington.

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