Traders Buy High Volume of Call Options on Halliburton (NYSE:HAL)

Key Points

• Halliburton experienced a significant increase in call options trading, with over 66,000 call options purchased, marking a 128% surge from the normal volume.
• Institutional ownership remains high, with 85.23% of Halliburton's shares held by institutional investors, reflecting strong support from major investment firms.
• The company's recent earnings report showed an EPS of $0.58, which exceeded analyst estimates, although revenue declined 1.7% compared to the previous year.

Halliburton Company (NYSE:HAL - Get Free Report) was the target of unusually large options trading activity on Wednesday. Stock investors bought 66,638 call options on the company. This is an increase of 128% compared to the typical volume of 29,288 call options.

Institutional Trading of Halliburton

Several large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in Halliburton by 1.6% during the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 105,363,599 shares of the oilfield services company's stock worth $2,147,310,000 after purchasing an additional 1,617,696 shares during the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in Halliburton by 1.2% during the 2nd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 30,287,989 shares of the oilfield services company's stock worth $617,269,000 after purchasing an additional 346,218 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in Halliburton by 0.4% during the 2nd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 22,342,963 shares of the oilfield services company's stock worth $453,461,000 after purchasing an additional 92,549 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. grew its position in Halliburton by 10.1% during the 2nd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 11,903,833 shares of the oilfield services company's stock worth $242,600,000 after purchasing an additional 1,089,928 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Pacer Advisors Inc. grew its position in Halliburton by 23.1% during the 3rd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 10,154,605 shares of the oilfield services company's stock worth $249,803,000 after purchasing an additional 1,906,724 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 85.23% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have commented on the stock. Weiss Ratings reissued a "hold (c-)" rating on shares of Halliburton in a research note on Wednesday, October 8th. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Halliburton from $22.00 to $20.00 and set an "equal weight" rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, October 14th. Melius Research initiated coverage on shares of Halliburton in a report on Wednesday, August 20th. They issued a "buy" rating and a $41.00 target price for the company. Stifel Nicolaus set a $32.00 target price on shares of Halliburton in a report on Wednesday. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lowered their target price on shares of Halliburton from $28.00 to $26.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, July 23rd. Sixteen research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have issued a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $31.00.

Halliburton Stock Up 4.2%

Shares of Halliburton stock traded up $1.06 on Wednesday, reaching $26.30. The stock had a trading volume of 25,375,992 shares, compared to its average volume of 14,958,510. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $22.76 and a 200 day moving average price of $21.70. The company has a quick ratio of 1.47, a current ratio of 2.00 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. Halliburton has a 1 year low of $18.72 and a 1 year high of $32.57. The stock has a market capitalization of $22.42 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.41 and a beta of 1.02.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 21st. The oilfield services company reported $0.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $0.50 by $0.08. Halliburton had a net margin of 5.91% and a return on equity of 20.00%. The firm had revenue of $5.60 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.39 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.73 EPS. The company's quarterly revenue was down 1.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Halliburton will post 2.64 EPS for the current year.

Halliburton Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 24th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 3rd were given a $0.17 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, September 3rd. This represents a $0.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.6%. Halliburton's payout ratio is presently 31.78%.

About Halliburton

Halliburton Company provides products and services to the energy industry worldwide. It operates through two segments, Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. The Completion and Production segment offers production enhancement services that include stimulation and sand control services; cementing services, such as well bonding and casing, and casing equipment; and completion tools that offer downhole solutions and services, including well completion products and services, intelligent well completions, and service tools, as well as liner hanger, sand control, and multilateral systems.

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