Nexus Investment Management ULC Boosts Holdings in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU)

Nexus Investment Management ULC lifted its stake in TELUS Co. (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) by 2.7% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 1,681,218 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 44,675 shares during the period. TELUS accounts for about 3.1% of Nexus Investment Management ULC’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 12th biggest holding. Nexus Investment Management ULC owned about 0.12% of TELUS worth $30,014,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of TU. Cetera Investment Advisers lifted its position in TELUS by 5.9% during the 2nd quarter. Cetera Investment Advisers now owns 11,475 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $223,000 after acquiring an additional 638 shares during the period. Captrust Financial Advisors lifted its position in TELUS by 18.1% during the 2nd quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 4,669 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $104,000 after acquiring an additional 717 shares during the period. VisionPoint Advisory Group LLC lifted its position in TELUS by 80.8% during the 3rd quarter. VisionPoint Advisory Group LLC now owns 1,654 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $27,000 after acquiring an additional 739 shares during the period. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP lifted its position in TELUS by 4.0% during the 3rd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 22,341 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $444,000 after acquiring an additional 861 shares during the period. Finally, Osaic Holdings Inc. lifted its position in TELUS by 5.1% during the 2nd quarter. Osaic Holdings Inc. now owns 20,125 shares of the Wireless communications provider’s stock valued at $390,000 after acquiring an additional 980 shares during the period. 49.40% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

TELUS Stock Performance

Shares of TU stock traded up $0.10 during trading hours on Friday, reaching $16.01. The company had a trading volume of 4,002,478 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,801,138. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $17.31 and a 200-day moving average price of $17.34. TELUS Co. has a one year low of $15.47 and a one year high of $21.34. The firm has a market cap of $23.63 billion, a PE ratio of 37.23, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.59 and a beta of 0.73. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.35, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a current ratio of 0.67.

TELUS (NYSE:TU) (TSE:T) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 9th. The Wireless communications provider reported $0.18 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.17 by $0.01. TELUS had a net margin of 4.18% and a return on equity of 7.81%. The firm had revenue of $5.20 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.24 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.17 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.8% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts predict that TELUS Co. will post 0.78 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

TELUS Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 1st. Investors of record on Monday, March 11th will be given a dividend of $0.2793 per share. This represents a $1.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 6.98%. This is a positive change from TELUS’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.27. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 8th. TELUS’s payout ratio is 258.14%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

TU has been the subject of a number of recent research reports. Scotiabank reissued a “sector perform” rating and set a $26.00 price target (down from $28.00) on shares of TELUS in a research report on Monday, March 25th. BMO Capital Markets reduced their price objective on shares of TELUS from $27.00 to $26.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 12th. StockNews.com lowered shares of TELUS from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 26th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered shares of TELUS from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, TELUS currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $27.72.

TELUS Profile

TELUS Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides a range of telecommunications and information technology products and services in Canada. It operates through Technology Solutions and Digitally-Led Customer Experiences segments. The Technology Solutions segment offers a range of telecommunications products and services; network services; healthcare services; mobile technologies equipment; data services, such as internet protocol; television; hosting, managed information technology, and cloud-based services; software, data management, and data analytics-driven smart food-chain and consumer goods technologies; home and business security; healthcare software and technology solutions; and voice and other telecommunications services, as well as mobile and fixed voice and data telecommunications services and products.