Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) Receives Consensus Recommendation of "Moderate Buy" from Analysts

Key Points

• Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) has received a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" from eight brokerages, with six analysts recommending a buy and two a hold.
• The company's average twelve-month target price is $20.58, and it recently increased its quarterly dividend from $0.40 to $0.47 per share.
• Hercules Capital reported earnings of $0.50 per share for the last quarter, exceeding analysts' expectations, with revenue up 10.0% year-over-year.

Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC - Get Free Report) has received a consensus recommendation of "Moderate Buy" from the eight brokerages that are presently covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and six have given a buy recommendation to the company. The average twelve-month target price among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $20.5833.

HTGC has been the subject of several analyst reports. Citigroup reissued an "outperform" rating on shares of Hercules Capital in a research note on Monday, August 4th. Piper Sandler lifted their price target on Hercules Capital from $20.00 to $21.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a report on Friday, August 1st. JMP Securities lifted their price target on Hercules Capital from $22.00 to $24.00 and gave the stock a "market outperform" rating in a report on Monday, August 4th. UBS Group lifted their price target on Hercules Capital from $18.50 to $19.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a report on Wednesday, July 16th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a "buy (b)" rating on shares of Hercules Capital in a report on Wednesday.

Institutional Trading of Hercules Capital

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. CWM LLC raised its stake in Hercules Capital by 79.6% during the 2nd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 1,381 shares of the financial services provider's stock valued at $25,000 after acquiring an additional 612 shares during the last quarter. Assetmark Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 173.4% in the 2nd quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 1,386 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $25,000 after acquiring an additional 879 shares during the period. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Hercules Capital in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $27,000. N.E.W. Advisory Services LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Hercules Capital in the 1st quarter worth approximately $30,000. Finally, Alpine Bank Wealth Management purchased a new stake in Hercules Capital in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $33,000. 19.69% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Hercules Capital Price Performance

HTGC stock opened at $17.72 on Thursday. Hercules Capital has a 52-week low of $15.65 and a 52-week high of $22.04. The company has a quick ratio of 1.68, a current ratio of 1.68 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.96. The business has a fifty day moving average of $19.14 and a two-hundred day moving average of $18.45. The stock has a market cap of $3.22 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 11.74 and a beta of 0.96.

Hercules Capital (NYSE:HTGC - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 31st. The financial services provider reported $0.50 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $0.47 by $0.03. Hercules Capital had a return on equity of 16.54% and a net margin of 51.46%.The business had revenue of $137.46 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $129.47 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.51 earnings per share. The company's revenue was up 10.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Hercules Capital will post 1.96 earnings per share for the current year.

Hercules Capital Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, August 19th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, August 12th were issued a dividend of $0.47 per share. This is a positive change from Hercules Capital's previous quarterly dividend of $0.40. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, August 12th. This represents a $1.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 10.6%. Hercules Capital's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 105.96%.

About Hercules Capital

Hercules Capital, Inc is a business development company. The firm specializing in providing venture debt, debt, senior secured loans, and growth capital to privately held venture capital-backed companies at all stages of development from startups to expansion stage including select publicly listed companies and select special opportunity lower middle market companies that require additional capital to fund acquisitions, recapitalizations and refinancing and established-stage companies.

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