Kentucky Retirement Systems Sells 694 Shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES)

Kentucky Retirement Systems reduced its position in shares of The AES Co. (NYSE:AES) by 1.3% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 53,577 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after selling 694 shares during the period. Kentucky Retirement Systems’ holdings in AES were worth $1,031,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. FMR LLC grew its holdings in AES by 38.6% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 36,821,650 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $559,689,000 after purchasing an additional 10,256,781 shares during the period. CI Investments Inc. raised its position in AES by 18,505.6% during the third quarter. CI Investments Inc. now owns 2,030,429 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $30,862,000 after acquiring an additional 2,019,516 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. raised its position in AES by 24.2% during the third quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 7,611,339 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $115,692,000 after acquiring an additional 1,484,052 shares in the last quarter. Barclays PLC grew its stake in shares of AES by 114.1% in the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 2,677,405 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $40,697,000 after acquiring an additional 1,426,662 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Electron Capital Partners LLC grew its stake in shares of AES by 9.3% in the third quarter. Electron Capital Partners LLC now owns 8,060,064 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $122,513,000 after acquiring an additional 686,719 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 93.13% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

AES has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $22.00 price objective on shares of AES in a research report on Tuesday, April 9th. Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of AES from $21.00 to $24.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 17th. Seaport Res Ptn cut shares of AES from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday. UBS Group dropped their target price on shares of AES from $20.00 to $19.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Finally, Argus reissued a “buy” rating and issued a $25.00 target price on shares of AES in a report on Tuesday, March 26th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $22.50.

AES Stock Performance

Shares of AES stock opened at $21.04 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $14.95 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.22 and a beta of 1.08. The AES Co. has a 52 week low of $11.43 and a 52 week high of $22.60. The company has a quick ratio of 0.71, a current ratio of 0.78 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.04. The firm has a 50 day moving average of $17.80 and a 200-day moving average of $17.48.

AES (NYSE:AES) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, May 3rd. The utilities provider reported $0.50 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.34 by $0.16. AES had a net margin of 4.40% and a return on equity of 36.23%. The business had revenue of $3.09 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.20 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.22 EPS. AES’s revenue was down 4.8% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts forecast that The AES Co. will post 1.91 earnings per share for the current year.

AES Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, May 15th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, May 1st were paid a dividend of $0.1725 per share. This represents a $0.69 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.28%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, April 30th. AES’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 95.83%.

About AES

The AES Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a diversified power generation and utility company in the United States and internationally. The company owns and/or operates power plants to generate and sell power to customers, such as utilities, industrial users, and other intermediaries; owns and/or operates utilities to generate or purchase, distribute, transmit, and sell electricity to end-user customers in the residential, commercial, industrial, and governmental sectors; and generates and sells electricity on the wholesale market.