Berkshire Hills Bancorp, Inc. (NYSE:BHLB) Short Interest Update

Berkshire Hills Bancorp, Inc. (NYSE:BHLB) saw a significant increase in short interest in September. As of September 15th, there was short interest totalling 1,170,000 shares, an increase of 13.6% from the August 31st total of 1,030,000 shares. Approximately 2.8% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average daily trading volume, of 306,100 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 3.8 days.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Berkshire Hills Bancorp

Hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. ProShare Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Berkshire Hills Bancorp by 7.4% in the first quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 8,752 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $201,000 after purchasing an additional 601 shares during the period. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC lifted its holdings in Berkshire Hills Bancorp by 0.7% during the first quarter. Commonwealth Equity Services LLC now owns 122,812 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $2,815,000 after acquiring an additional 876 shares in the last quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company lifted its holdings in Berkshire Hills Bancorp by 4.9% during the second quarter. The Manufacturers Life Insurance Company now owns 22,799 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $520,000 after acquiring an additional 1,071 shares in the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD grew its stake in Berkshire Hills Bancorp by 5.8% in the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 31,988 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock valued at $734,000 after acquiring an additional 1,753 shares during the period. Finally, Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. increased its holdings in shares of Berkshire Hills Bancorp by 58.5% in the second quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 5,879 shares of the savings and loans company’s stock worth $134,000 after acquiring an additional 2,169 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 83.07% of the company’s stock.

Berkshire Hills Bancorp Stock Up 1.4 %

Shares of NYSE:BHLB opened at $26.93 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28, a current ratio of 1.01 and a quick ratio of 1.01. The stock has a market cap of $1.17 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 53.86 and a beta of 0.86. The company has a 50 day moving average of $26.67 and a 200-day moving average of $23.90. Berkshire Hills Bancorp has a one year low of $18.31 and a one year high of $28.51.

Berkshire Hills Bancorp (NYSE:BHLB) last released its earnings results on Thursday, July 18th. The savings and loans company reported $0.55 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.52 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $174.24 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $108.46 million. Berkshire Hills Bancorp had a net margin of 3.37% and a return on equity of 8.61%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.55 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Berkshire Hills Bancorp will post 2.12 earnings per share for the current year.

Berkshire Hills Bancorp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, October 10th. Investors of record on Monday, September 30th will be issued a $0.18 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, September 30th. This represents a $0.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.67%. Berkshire Hills Bancorp’s dividend payout ratio is presently 144.00%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

BHLB has been the topic of a number of research reports. Janney Montgomery Scott lowered shares of Berkshire Hills Bancorp from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $28.00 target price on the stock. in a research report on Monday, July 22nd. StockNews.com raised Berkshire Hills Bancorp from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Wednesday, July 24th. Finally, Hovde Group increased their price objective on Berkshire Hills Bancorp from $28.00 to $31.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, July 19th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Berkshire Hills Bancorp presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $26.80.

About Berkshire Hills Bancorp

Berkshire Hills Bancorp, Inc operates as the bank holding company for Berkshire Bank that provides various banking products and services in the United States. The company provides various deposit accounts, including demand deposit, interest-bearing checking, regular savings, money market savings, time certificates of deposit, and retirement deposit accounts.