Raymond James & Associates Has $5.80 Million Stock Position in Avista Co. (NYSE:AVA)

Raymond James & Associates lowered its position in shares of Avista Co. (NYSE:AVA – Get Rating) by 4.5% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 130,701 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after selling 6,205 shares during the quarter. Raymond James & Associates’ holdings in Avista were worth $5,795,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. State Street Corp grew its position in Avista by 27.0% during the 1st quarter. State Street Corp now owns 3,311,667 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $149,522,000 after purchasing an additional 704,947 shares in the last quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. boosted its position in shares of Avista by 189.9% in the third quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 641,007 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $23,749,000 after buying an additional 419,864 shares during the period. PATRIZIA Pty Ltd purchased a new position in shares of Avista during the fourth quarter valued at $12,492,000. Nuveen Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Avista by 86.3% during the third quarter. Nuveen Asset Management LLC now owns 515,506 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $19,100,000 after buying an additional 238,745 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Avista by 2.6% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 8,839,530 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $327,504,000 after buying an additional 228,077 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.92% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

AVA has been the topic of several research analyst reports. StockNews.com began coverage on Avista in a research note on Thursday. They set a “sell” rating on the stock. Mizuho cut shares of Avista from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and decreased their price target for the stock from $45.00 to $38.00 in a report on Thursday, February 9th. Finally, TheStreet upgraded shares of Avista from a “c+” rating to a “b-” rating in a research note on Wednesday, February 22nd.

Avista Stock Performance

Shares of AVA stock opened at $42.43 on Monday. Avista Co. has a fifty-two week low of $35.72 and a fifty-two week high of $45.28. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $43.10 and its two-hundred day moving average is $41.90. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.08, a current ratio of 1.08 and a quick ratio of 0.92. The firm has a market cap of $3.21 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.81, a PEG ratio of 2.89 and a beta of 0.51.

Avista (NYSE:AVA – Get Rating) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 3rd. The utilities provider reported $0.73 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.16 by ($0.43). The firm had revenue of $474.60 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $485.37 million. Avista had a net margin of 8.04% and a return on equity of 6.02%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 2.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.99 EPS. Analysts predict that Avista Co. will post 2.32 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Avista Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 26th will be issued a dividend of $0.46 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, May 25th. This represents a $1.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.34%. Avista’s dividend payout ratio is currently 98.93%.

Insider Activity at Avista

In other Avista news, VP Bryan Alden Cox sold 2,542 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, February 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $41.30, for a total transaction of $104,984.60. Following the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 4,698 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $194,027.40. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. 1.00% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Avista Company Profile

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Avista Corp. is a holding company, which engages in the provision of electric and natural gas utility business. It operates through the Avista Utilities, and Alaska Electric Light and Power Company (AEL&P) segments. The Avista Utilities segment includes electric distribution and transmission, and natural gas distribution services in parts of eastern Washington, Northern Idaho, and Northeastern and Southwestern Oregon.