New York State Common Retirement Fund Sells 88,022 Shares of Williams Companies, Inc. (The) $WMB

New York State Common Retirement Fund trimmed its holdings in Williams Companies, Inc. (The) (NYSE:WMB) by 5.8% in the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 1,417,679 shares of the pipeline company’s stock after selling 88,022 shares during the quarter. New York State Common Retirement Fund’s holdings in Williams Companies were worth $89,810,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of WMB. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in Williams Companies by 1.5% in the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 133,075,340 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $8,358,462,000 after purchasing an additional 1,912,156 shares during the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. grew its position in Williams Companies by 27.3% during the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 14,417,821 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $905,583,000 after buying an additional 3,089,390 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in Williams Companies during the second quarter valued at about $765,164,000. BROOKFIELD Corp ON increased its stake in Williams Companies by 190.3% during the second quarter. BROOKFIELD Corp ON now owns 12,028,186 shares of the pipeline company’s stock valued at $755,490,000 after acquiring an additional 7,884,730 shares during the period. Finally, Legal & General Group Plc lifted its position in shares of Williams Companies by 9.9% in the 2nd quarter. Legal & General Group Plc now owns 10,056,234 shares of the pipeline company’s stock worth $631,632,000 after acquiring an additional 903,457 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 86.44% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Williams Companies

In other news, SVP Terrance Lane Wilson sold 2,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $61.90, for a total value of $123,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president directly owned 297,545 shares in the company, valued at approximately $18,418,035.50. This trade represents a 0.67% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Insiders own 0.44% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of analysts have recently issued reports on the company. Zacks Research cut Williams Companies from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 6th. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price objective on shares of Williams Companies from $59.00 to $65.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. Tudor Pickering raised shares of Williams Companies from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 1st. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Williams Companies in a research note on Monday, December 29th. Finally, Barclays raised their price target on shares of Williams Companies from $65.00 to $66.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 14th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have given a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $68.29.

Williams Companies Trading Up 0.4%

Shares of WMB stock opened at $67.21 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $82.08 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.64, a P/E/G ratio of 1.57 and a beta of 0.64. Williams Companies, Inc. has a 12-month low of $51.58 and a 12-month high of $68.27. The company has a quick ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.42 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.73. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $61.00 and a 200 day moving average price of $60.01.

Williams Companies (NYSE:WMB) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 3rd. The pipeline company reported $0.49 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.51 by ($0.02). Williams Companies had a return on equity of 16.74% and a net margin of 20.61%.The firm had revenue of $2.92 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.87 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.43 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 10.2% on a year-over-year basis. Williams Companies has set its FY 2025 guidance at 2.010-2.190 EPS. Research analysts forecast that Williams Companies, Inc. will post 2.08 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Williams Companies Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 30th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be paid a $0.525 dividend. This is an increase from Williams Companies’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.1%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 13th. Williams Companies’s payout ratio is presently 103.09%.

Williams Companies Profile

Williams Companies, Inc (NYSE: WMB) is a U.S.-based energy infrastructure company focused on the midstream segment of the natural gas value chain. The company develops, owns and operates assets that gather, process, transport and store natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGLs). Its operations support the movement of gas from production areas to end users including utilities, power generators, industrial customers and export facilities.

Williams’s product and service offering includes interstate and intrastate pipeline transmission, gas-gathering systems, processing facilities that remove impurities and separate NGLs, storage services and fractionation and transportation of NGL products.