Corient IA LLC Buys New Position in BP p.l.c. $BP

Key Points

• Corient IA LLC has purchased 10,000 shares of BP p.l.c. worth approximately $338,000, reflecting growing interest among institutional investors in the oil and gas exploration company.
• Analysts have mixed views on BP, with several boosting their ratings; Berenberg Bank upgraded BP to "strong-buy" while Morgan Stanley downgraded it to "underweight".
• BP announced an increase in its quarterly dividend to $0.4942 per share, representing an annualized yield of 5.8% and a substantial payout ratio of 942.86%.

Corient IA LLC bought a new position in BP p.l.c. (NYSE:BP - Free Report) in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund bought 10,000 shares of the oil and gas exploration company's stock, valued at approximately $338,000.

Several other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of BP. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of BP by 217.4% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 107,282 shares of the oil and gas exploration company's stock valued at $3,171,000 after purchasing an additional 73,478 shares in the last quarter. Syon Capital LLC raised its stake in shares of BP by 38.9% in the fourth quarter. Syon Capital LLC now owns 21,476 shares of the oil and gas exploration company's stock valued at $635,000 after purchasing an additional 6,019 shares in the last quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. raised its stake in shares of BP by 4.3% in the fourth quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 940,786 shares of the oil and gas exploration company's stock valued at $27,810,000 after purchasing an additional 38,759 shares in the last quarter. Cary Street Partners Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of BP in the fourth quarter valued at $1,255,000. Finally, Fiduciary Trust Co raised its stake in shares of BP by 28.7% in the fourth quarter. Fiduciary Trust Co now owns 13,189 shares of the oil and gas exploration company's stock valued at $390,000 after purchasing an additional 2,944 shares in the last quarter. 11.01% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

BP has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Jefferies Financial Group set a $29.00 price objective on BP and gave the stock a "hold" rating in a research note on Monday, May 19th. Scotiabank upgraded BP from a "sector perform" rating to a "sector outperform" rating and set a $42.00 target price for the company in a research note on Thursday, August 14th. Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on BP from $27.00 to $32.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Thursday, June 26th. TD Cowen raised their target price on BP from $34.00 to $37.00 and gave the company a "hold" rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 6th. Finally, Berenberg Bank upgraded BP from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating in a research note on Thursday, August 7th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, four have given a Buy rating, ten have assigned a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $41.77.

BP Stock Up 1.9%

Shares of NYSE:BP traded up $0.6570 during trading on Friday, hitting $34.7070. 7,451,528 shares of the company's stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 7,646,059. BP p.l.c. has a 52 week low of $25.22 and a 52 week high of $35.54. The company has a current ratio of 1.21, a quick ratio of 0.92 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. The company has a market cap of $91.55 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 165.28, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.79 and a beta of 0.57. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $32.23 and a 200-day moving average price of $31.32.

BP (NYSE:BP - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 5th. The oil and gas exploration company reported $0.90 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.68 by $0.22. BP had a return on equity of 9.08% and a net margin of 0.29%.The business had revenue of $46.63 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $42.88 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.00 EPS. BP's revenue for the quarter was down 1.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts forecast that BP p.l.c. will post 3.53 EPS for the current fiscal year.

BP Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, September 19th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 15th will be issued a dividend of $0.4942 per share. This is a boost from BP's previous quarterly dividend of $0.48. The ex-dividend date is Friday, August 15th. This represents a $1.98 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.7%. BP's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 938.10%.

BP Company Profile

BP p.l.c. provides carbon products and services. The company operates through Gas & Low Carbon Energy, Oil Production & Operations, and Customers & Products segments. It engages in the production of natural gas, and integrated gas and power; trading of gas; operation of onshore and offshore wind power, as well as hydrogen and carbon capture and storage facilities; trading and marketing of renewable and non-renewable power; and production of crude oil.