EP Wealth Advisors LLC Buys 6,850 Shares of Sunoco LP (NYSE:SUN)

EP Wealth Advisors LLC raised its stake in Sunoco LP (NYSE:SUN – Get Rating) by 115.4% in the third quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 12,784 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock after acquiring an additional 6,850 shares during the quarter. EP Wealth Advisors LLC’s holdings in Sunoco were worth $498,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in SUN. Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. increased its stake in shares of Sunoco by 8.9% in the first quarter. Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. now owns 13,939 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $569,000 after buying an additional 1,140 shares during the period. HighTower Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of Sunoco by 70.2% in the first quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC now owns 23,016 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $941,000 after buying an additional 9,491 shares during the period. Cetera Advisor Networks LLC increased its stake in shares of Sunoco by 7.1% in the first quarter. Cetera Advisor Networks LLC now owns 5,369 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $219,000 after buying an additional 357 shares during the period. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Sunoco by 5.3% in the first quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 25,640 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $1,048,000 after buying an additional 1,300 shares during the period. Finally, International Assets Investment Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Sunoco by 1.7% in the first quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 15,519 shares of the oil and gas company’s stock valued at $634,000 after buying an additional 266 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 16.16% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have recently issued reports on SUN. Raymond James upped their price objective on Sunoco from $51.00 to $52.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 16th. Citigroup increased their target price on shares of Sunoco from $44.00 to $48.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 21st. StockNews.com started coverage on shares of Sunoco in a research report on Thursday. They set a “hold” rating for the company. Mizuho increased their target price on shares of Sunoco from $48.00 to $53.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 16th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company raised shares of Sunoco from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and increased their target price for the company from $43.00 to $47.00 in a research report on Friday, December 16th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $49.67.

Sunoco Stock Performance

Shares of SUN stock opened at $41.60 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $4.18 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 8.87 and a beta of 1.36. Sunoco LP has a 52 week low of $34.26 and a 52 week high of $48.59. The company has a quick ratio of 0.83, a current ratio of 1.41 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.79. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $45.79 and a 200-day moving average of $43.01.

Sunoco (NYSE:SUN – Get Rating) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 15th. The oil and gas company reported $0.42 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.77 by ($0.35). The company had revenue of $5.92 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.95 billion. Sunoco had a return on equity of 49.43% and a net margin of 1.85%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 19.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.95 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that Sunoco LP will post 4.34 earnings per share for the current year.

Sunoco Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, February 21st. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 7th were given a dividend of $0.8255 per share. This represents a $3.30 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 7.94%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, February 6th. Sunoco’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 70.36%.

Sunoco Profile

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Sunoco LP engages in the management and distribution of fuel products. It operates through Fuel Distribution and Marketing and All Other segments. The Fuel Distribution and Marketing segment supplies fuels and other petroleum products, which it supplies to third-party dealers and distributors, independent operators of commission agent, other commercial consumers of motor fuel and to retail locations.