Suncor Energy Target of Unusually Large Options Trading (NYSE:SU)

Suncor Energy Inc. (NYSE:SU) (TSE:SU) saw unusually large options trading on Wednesday. Stock investors bought 28,315 put options on the stock. This is an increase of approximately 2,998% compared to the average daily volume of 914 put options.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

SU has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. ATB Cormark Capital Markets raised Suncor Energy from a “hold” rating to a “moderate buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 1st. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price objective on Suncor Energy from $66.00 to $73.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 1st. Wall Street Zen raised Suncor Energy from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, May 9th. Weiss Ratings raised Suncor Energy from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Finally, Zacks Research raised Suncor Energy from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 2nd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have assigned a Buy rating and one has given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $72.00.

Suncor Energy Stock Down 0.7%

Shares of NYSE SU opened at $66.10 on Thursday. Suncor Energy has a one year low of $34.67 and a one year high of $70.29. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a current ratio of 1.42 and a quick ratio of 0.92. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $63.35 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $52.92. The stock has a market capitalization of $78.04 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.35 and a beta of 0.31.

Suncor Energy (NYSE:SU) (TSE:SU) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, May 5th. The oil and gas producer reported $1.41 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.45 by ($0.04). Suncor Energy had a net margin of 12.29% and a return on equity of 13.96%. The business had revenue of $10.41 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.22 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.31 earnings per share. As a group, analysts expect that Suncor Energy will post 6.34 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Suncor Energy Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 25th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 4th will be given a dividend of $0.60 per share. This represents a $2.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.6%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, June 4th. Suncor Energy’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 46.19%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the business. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in Suncor Energy by 2.1% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 55,720,921 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $2,473,173,000 after acquiring an additional 1,166,405 shares during the last quarter. Artisan Partners Limited Partnership grew its position in Suncor Energy by 0.4% during the third quarter. Artisan Partners Limited Partnership now owns 33,868,775 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $1,417,029,000 after acquiring an additional 145,800 shares during the last quarter. Dodge & Cox grew its position in Suncor Energy by 0.3% during the third quarter. Dodge & Cox now owns 27,471,954 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $1,148,602,000 after acquiring an additional 70,300 shares during the last quarter. FIL Ltd grew its position in Suncor Energy by 14.0% during the fourth quarter. FIL Ltd now owns 21,050,387 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $934,312,000 after acquiring an additional 2,592,516 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its position in Suncor Energy by 2.7% during the fourth quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 19,371,704 shares of the oil and gas producer’s stock valued at $860,933,000 after acquiring an additional 516,783 shares during the last quarter. 67.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Suncor Energy

Suncor Energy Inc is a Canadian integrated energy company headquartered in Calgary, Alberta. The company’s operations span the full oil and gas value chain, with principal activities in oil sands development and production, conventional exploration and production, refining, distribution and retail marketing of petroleum products. Suncor supplies crude, synthetic crude and refined fuels as well as related products and services to commercial and consumer markets.

Upstream, Suncor is a major developer and operator of oil sands projects in Alberta, using both mining and in situ technologies to produce bitumen and synthetic crude.