Meritage Portfolio Management Has $3.14 Million Stake in Evergy Inc. $EVRG

Meritage Portfolio Management reduced its position in shares of Evergy Inc. (NASDAQ:EVRG) by 41.4% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 41,348 shares of the company’s stock after selling 29,184 shares during the quarter. Meritage Portfolio Management’s holdings in Evergy were worth $3,143,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Magellan Asset Management Ltd grew its holdings in shares of Evergy by 1,418.7% during the second quarter. Magellan Asset Management Ltd now owns 2,364,493 shares of the company’s stock valued at $162,985,000 after buying an additional 2,208,799 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its position in Evergy by 969.3% during the 3rd quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 1,329,424 shares of the company’s stock worth $101,063,000 after acquiring an additional 1,205,101 shares during the period. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp grew its stake in Evergy by 44.4% during the 2nd quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Trust & Banking Corp now owns 2,470,917 shares of the company’s stock valued at $170,320,000 after acquiring an additional 760,301 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Evergy by 1.7% in the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 30,966,777 shares of the company’s stock valued at $2,134,540,000 after purchasing an additional 521,310 shares during the period. Finally, Truist Financial Corp increased its holdings in shares of Evergy by 2,959.7% in the 2nd quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 534,558 shares of the company’s stock valued at $36,847,000 after purchasing an additional 517,087 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.24% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts recently commented on the stock. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Evergy from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Monday, December 22nd. Citigroup lifted their price objective on Evergy from $79.00 to $89.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, November 10th. Wells Fargo & Company raised Evergy to a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 28th. UBS Group lifted their price target on Evergy from $81.00 to $83.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 17th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada upgraded Evergy to a “moderate buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 28th. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have assigned a Buy rating and two have issued a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $82.75.

Evergy Stock Performance

EVRG opened at $75.78 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.20, a quick ratio of 0.30 and a current ratio of 0.52. The company has a market cap of $17.45 billion, a PE ratio of 20.76, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.04 and a beta of 0.67. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $74.43 and a 200-day moving average of $73.50. Evergy Inc. has a 52-week low of $61.64 and a 52-week high of $79.32.

Evergy (NASDAQ:EVRG) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, November 5th. The company reported $2.03 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.14 by ($0.11). The company had revenue of $1.81 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.24 billion. Evergy had a return on equity of 8.66% and a net margin of 14.45%.The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down .1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.02 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Evergy Inc. will post 3.83 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Evergy Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, December 19th. Investors of record on Friday, November 21st were issued a dividend of $0.695 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, November 21st. This represents a $2.78 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.7%. This is an increase from Evergy’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.67. Evergy’s payout ratio is currently 76.16%.

Evergy Profile

Evergy, Inc is a regulated electric utility that generates, transmits and distributes electricity to residential, commercial and industrial customers primarily across Kansas and western Missouri. The company provides core utility services including retail electric delivery, grid operations, customer service and outage restoration, operating under state regulatory frameworks. Evergy serves a mix of urban and rural communities, including portions of the Kansas City metropolitan area and other population centers in its service territory.

The company’s business activities span power generation, system planning, transmission and distribution infrastructure, and customer-facing programs such as energy efficiency and demand-side management.