Heartland Advisors Inc. Has $3.54 Million Position in NorthWestern Corporation $NWE

Heartland Advisors Inc. reduced its stake in shares of NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ:NWE) by 22.9% during the 1st quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund owned 53,687 shares of the company’s stock after selling 15,940 shares during the period. Heartland Advisors Inc.’s holdings in NorthWestern were worth $3,540,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also modified their holdings of NWE. Signaturefd LLC raised its holdings in shares of NorthWestern by 28.5% during the fourth quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 879 shares of the company’s stock worth $57,000 after acquiring an additional 195 shares in the last quarter. Strs Ohio increased its position in NorthWestern by 1.1% in the 4th quarter. Strs Ohio now owns 18,800 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,213,000 after purchasing an additional 200 shares during the last quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. increased its position in NorthWestern by 34.3% in the 2nd quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 845 shares of the company’s stock worth $43,000 after purchasing an additional 216 shares during the last quarter. Advisory Services Network LLC raised its stake in shares of NorthWestern by 3.4% during the 3rd quarter. Advisory Services Network LLC now owns 6,763 shares of the company’s stock worth $396,000 after purchasing an additional 224 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Parallel Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of NorthWestern by 31.1% during the 3rd quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 1,074 shares of the company’s stock worth $63,000 after purchasing an additional 255 shares in the last quarter. 96.07% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts recently commented on NWE shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on NorthWestern from $73.00 to $76.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 9th. LADENBURG THALM/SH SH raised shares of NorthWestern from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $56.00 to $75.50 in a research report on Wednesday, April 1st. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of NorthWestern from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Wall Street Zen raised shares of NorthWestern to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, April 25th. Finally, Barclays increased their price target on shares of NorthWestern from $62.00 to $75.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, April 20th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, two have given a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, NorthWestern presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $70.10.

NorthWestern Price Performance

Shares of NWE stock opened at $72.06 on Monday. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $70.96 and its 200 day simple moving average is $69.39. NorthWestern Corporation has a twelve month low of $51.92 and a twelve month high of $75.18. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.10, a quick ratio of 0.52 and a current ratio of 0.70. The company has a market capitalization of $4.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.49, a PEG ratio of 3.80 and a beta of 0.34.

NorthWestern (NASDAQ:NWE) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The company reported $1.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.29 by $0.02. NorthWestern had a return on equity of 7.80% and a net margin of 10.21%.The firm had revenue of $516.60 million during the quarter. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.22 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that NorthWestern Corporation will post 3.75 EPS for the current year.

NorthWestern Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, June 30th. Investors of record on Monday, June 15th were issued a dividend of $0.67 per share. This represents a $2.68 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, June 15th. NorthWestern’s dividend payout ratio is currently 98.53%.

About NorthWestern

NorthWestern Corporation (NASDAQ: NWE) is a regulated energy company that delivers electricity and natural gas to residential, commercial and industrial customers. Through its Electric Operations and Gas Operations segments, the company operates an extensive network of distribution lines, substations and pipelines. NorthWestern’s services encompass the delivery of power sourced from regional transmission systems and the procurement, storage and distribution of natural gas to end users.

Electric delivery services include the management of distribution infrastructure, customer metering and system reliability programs.