Clarius Group LLC Reduces Holdings in Halliburton (NYSE:HAL)

Clarius Group LLC reduced its stake in shares of Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) by 13.0% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 7,340 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock after selling 1,096 shares during the quarter. Clarius Group LLC’s holdings in Halliburton were worth $265,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in HAL. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Halliburton by 1.5% in the first quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 18,691,333 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $590,048,000 after acquiring an additional 271,718 shares in the last quarter. Morgan Stanley raised its holdings in shares of Halliburton by 65.5% in the fourth quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 17,217,776 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $677,520,000 after acquiring an additional 6,815,373 shares in the last quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main raised its holdings in shares of Halliburton by 123.0% in the fourth quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 15,936,342 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $627,088,000 after acquiring an additional 8,791,319 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new stake in shares of Halliburton in the fourth quarter valued at about $457,245,000. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its holdings in shares of Halliburton by 3.8% in the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,384,178 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock valued at $408,617,000 after acquiring an additional 384,016 shares in the last quarter. 85.23% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Activity at Halliburton

In related news, Director Margaret Katherine Banks sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.30, for a total value of $176,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 9,625 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $339,762.50. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. In related news, Director Margaret Katherine Banks sold 5,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.30, for a total value of $176,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 9,625 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $339,762.50. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Jeffrey Allen Miller sold 377,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, March 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $35.30, for a total value of $13,308,100.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 759,015 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $26,793,229.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.61% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have commented on HAL. Raymond James reduced their target price on shares of Halliburton from $49.00 to $47.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, January 24th. UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $44.00 to $48.00 in a report on Monday, January 22nd. TD Cowen upped their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $49.00 to $51.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 24th. Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $45.00 target price on shares of Halliburton in a research report on Wednesday, January 24th. Finally, Atb Cap Markets lowered Halliburton from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 22nd. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, ten have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $48.53.

Halliburton Trading Down 1.4 %

Shares of HAL stock opened at $39.10 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 2.06 and a quick ratio of 1.48. The company has a market cap of $34.66 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.34, a PEG ratio of 0.99 and a beta of 2.00. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $37.18 and a 200-day simple moving average of $37.42. Halliburton has a 1-year low of $27.84 and a 1-year high of $43.85.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last announced its earnings results on Tuesday, January 23rd. The oilfield services company reported $0.86 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.80 by $0.06. The business had revenue of $5.74 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.78 billion. Halliburton had a return on equity of 31.59% and a net margin of 11.46%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $0.72 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Halliburton will post 3.42 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Halliburton Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 27th. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 6th were paid a $0.17 dividend. This is an increase from Halliburton’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.16. This represents a $0.68 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, March 5th. Halliburton’s dividend payout ratio is currently 23.21%.

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.