Stock Traders Purchase Large Volume of HP Call Options (NYSE:HPQ)

HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) was the target of some unusual options trading on Friday. Stock investors purchased 42,365 call options on the stock. This represents an increase of 70% compared to the typical volume of 24,932 call options.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently issued reports on HPQ. Citigroup decreased their price objective on HP from $22.00 to $20.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, February 17th. Bank of America reiterated an “underperform” rating and issued a $20.00 price objective (down from $26.00) on shares of HP in a research report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on HP from $16.00 to $17.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Thursday. UBS Group decreased their price objective on HP from $26.00 to $20.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 19th. Finally, Evercore set a $22.00 price objective on HP in a research report on Thursday, February 19th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have assigned a Hold rating and five have assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Reduce” and a consensus target price of $21.67.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On HP

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in shares of HP by 1.9% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 132,094,388 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $2,943,063,000 after purchasing an additional 2,435,634 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp raised its stake in shares of HP by 5.3% during the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 52,703,639 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $1,450,245,000 after purchasing an additional 2,651,623 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of HP by 1.0% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 27,313,924 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $607,373,000 after purchasing an additional 274,033 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. raised its stake in shares of HP by 31.7% during the 4th quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 15,236,428 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $339,468,000 after purchasing an additional 3,671,511 shares in the last quarter. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of HP by 50.2% during the 4th quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 13,582,142 shares of the computer maker’s stock worth $302,610,000 after purchasing an additional 4,542,339 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 77.53% of the company’s stock.

HP Stock Performance

NYSE HPQ traded up $3.29 during trading on Friday, hitting $25.19. The stock had a trading volume of 21,682,320 shares, compared to its average volume of 18,530,027. The company has a market capitalization of $23.04 billion, a PE ratio of 9.53, a P/E/G ratio of 5.85 and a beta of 1.09. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $19.78 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $21.15. HP has a 12 month low of $17.56 and a 12 month high of $29.55.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, February 24th. The computer maker reported $0.81 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.77 by $0.04. The firm had revenue of $14.44 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $13.87 billion. HP had a negative return on equity of 367.41% and a net margin of 4.46%.The business’s quarterly revenue was up 6.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.74 EPS. HP has set its Q2 2026 guidance at 0.700-0.760 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that HP will post 2.84 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

HP Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 1st. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, June 10th will be paid a dividend of $0.30 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, June 10th. This represents a $1.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.8%. HP’s dividend payout ratio is currently 45.45%.

About HP

HP Inc is an American multinational information technology company that designs, manufactures and sells personal computing devices, printers and related supplies and services. Its product portfolio spans consumer and commercial notebooks and desktops, workstations, displays and accessories, as well as an extensive line of printing hardware that includes home, office and production printers. HP also provides consumables such as ink and toner, managed print services, device deployment and lifecycle support, and software for device and print management.

Founded from the original Hewlett‑Packard Company, HP Inc became a separately traded public company in 2015 following a corporate split that created Hewlett Packard Enterprise to focus on enterprise hardware and services.