The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company Buys New Shares in Hilltop Holdings Inc. $HTH

The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company purchased a new position in Hilltop Holdings Inc. (NYSE:HTH) during the 2nd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm purchased 21,219 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $823,000.

Several other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of HTH. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans boosted its stake in shares of Hilltop by 156.7% during the 4th quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 81,675 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $2,772,000 after acquiring an additional 49,859 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. raised its position in shares of Hilltop by 39.8% during the first quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 286,079 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $10,247,000 after purchasing an additional 81,448 shares during the period. Bessemer Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Hilltop by 43.3% during the first quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 165,263 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $5,920,000 after purchasing an additional 49,900 shares during the last quarter. Bank of America Corp DE lifted its holdings in shares of Hilltop by 159.3% during the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 211,095 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $7,561,000 after purchasing an additional 129,683 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Deutsche Bank AG acquired a new position in shares of Hilltop in the 2nd quarter valued at $2,806,000. Institutional investors own 57.13% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Hilltop

In other news, Director Rhodes Bobbitt sold 5,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, August 24th. The stock was sold at an average price of $38.80, for a total value of $194,000.00. Following the sale, the director directly owned 25,641 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $994,870.80. This trade represents a 16.32% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Insiders have sold 52,555 shares of company stock worth $2,087,714 in the last three months. 5.40% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts recently weighed in on HTH shares. Piper Sandler reissued a “neutral” rating and issued a $42.00 price target on shares of Hilltop in a research note on Tuesday, July 28th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upped their price objective on shares of Hilltop from $40.00 to $42.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 5th. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of Hilltop from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b+)” rating in a report on Wednesday. Finally, Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Hilltop from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Saturday, May 16th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has given a Buy rating and three have issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $40.00.

Hilltop Price Performance

NYSE HTH opened at $39.20 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $2.25 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 14.52 and a beta of 0.88. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $38.83 and a 200-day simple moving average of $37.76. Hilltop Holdings Inc. has a 52-week low of $30.78 and a 52-week high of $40.41.

Hilltop (NYSE:HTH) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 23rd. The financial services provider reported $0.63 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.49 by $0.14. Hilltop had a net margin of 10.17% and a return on equity of 7.40%. The firm had revenue of $315.81 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $306.18 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.57 earnings per share. On average, analysts predict that Hilltop Holdings Inc. will post 2.59 EPS for the current year.

Hilltop Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 21st. Shareholders of record on Friday, August 7th were given a dividend of $0.22 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 7th. This represents a $0.88 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.2%. This is a positive change from Hilltop’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.20. Hilltop’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 32.59%.

Hilltop Company Profile

Hilltop Holdings, Inc (NYSE: HTH) is a Dallas, Texas–based financial holding company offering commercial banking, mortgage lending and capital markets services through its three primary subsidiaries: PlainsCapital Corporation, PrimeLending and HilltopSecurities. PlainsCapital provides deposit, lending and treasury management solutions to small and mid-sized businesses, professionals and individuals. PrimeLending specializes in home purchase and refinance loans, serving retail, wholesale and correspondent channels.