Holos Integrated Wealth LLC Buys Shares of 20,455 Essential Utilities Inc. $WTRG

Holos Integrated Wealth LLC purchased a new stake in Essential Utilities Inc. (NYSE:WTRG) during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm purchased 20,455 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $791,000.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Brighton Jones LLC purchased a new position in Essential Utilities in the fourth quarter valued at about $638,000. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. lifted its position in shares of Essential Utilities by 7.8% during the first quarter. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. now owns 12,861 shares of the company’s stock valued at $508,000 after buying an additional 928 shares during the last quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Essential Utilities by 1.8% during the first quarter. NewEdge Advisors LLC now owns 29,674 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,173,000 after buying an additional 530 shares during the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Essential Utilities by 122.7% in the 1st quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 943,797 shares of the company’s stock valued at $37,308,000 after buying an additional 519,933 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Focus Partners Wealth grew its position in shares of Essential Utilities by 4.9% in the 1st quarter. Focus Partners Wealth now owns 22,322 shares of the company’s stock worth $882,000 after buying an additional 1,044 shares during the last quarter. 74.78% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

WTRG has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Barclays set a $38.00 price objective on shares of Essential Utilities and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 17th. Northcoast Research upgraded shares of Essential Utilities from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $42.00 target price for the company in a research note on Wednesday, December 3rd. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “hold (c+)” rating on shares of Essential Utilities in a report on Monday, December 29th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has assigned a Buy rating, five have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $43.20.

Essential Utilities Trading Down 0.4%

Essential Utilities stock opened at $40.51 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.18, a quick ratio of 0.65 and a current ratio of 0.80. The stock has a market cap of $11.48 billion, a PE ratio of 18.33 and a beta of 0.82. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $39.36 and a two-hundred day moving average of $39.13. Essential Utilities Inc. has a one year low of $36.32 and a one year high of $42.37.

Essential Utilities (NYSE:WTRG) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 26th. The company reported $0.47 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.36 by $0.11. Essential Utilities had a return on equity of 9.18% and a net margin of 24.91%.The business had revenue of $699.11 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $611.60 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.67 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 15.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts anticipate that Essential Utilities Inc. will post 1.99 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Essential Utilities Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 1st. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, May 12th will be given a dividend of $0.3426 per share. This represents a $1.37 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, May 12th. Essential Utilities’s payout ratio is currently 61.99%.

Essential Utilities Company Profile

Essential Utilities, Inc, formerly known as Aqua America, is a publicly traded water and natural gas utility holding company. Through its regulated water and wastewater subsidiaries, the company provides essential water services to residential, commercial and industrial customers. In addition, Essential Utilities delivers natural gas distribution services in Pennsylvania through its Peoples Gas subsidiary, offering integrated utility solutions under a unified corporate framework.

The company traces its roots to the Philadelphia Suburban Water Company, founded in 1886 to serve growing communities outside Philadelphia.