Desjardins Cuts BCE (TSE:BCE) Price Target to C$41.00

BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) had its price objective cut by investment analysts at Desjardins from C$43.00 to C$41.00 in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday, BayStreet reports. The firm currently has a “buy” rating on the stock. Desjardins’ target price suggests a potential upside of 45.44% from the company’s current price.

BCE has been the topic of a number of other reports. Scotia raised their price target on shares of BCE from C$39.00 to C$40.00 and gave the stock a “sector outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, August 7th. National Bank Financial lowered their price target on BCE from C$38.00 to C$36.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 1st. TD Securities upgraded BCE from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 1st. Royal Bank Of Canada reduced their price objective on shares of BCE from C$39.00 to C$36.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, July 10th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised BCE from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from C$31.00 to C$35.00 in a research report on Tuesday, July 21st. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have assigned a Buy rating and four have issued a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, BCE currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of C$37.31.

BCE Trading Up 0.6%

BCE traded up C$0.16 during trading on Wednesday, hitting C$28.19. 2,475,480 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 4,225,634. BCE has a 1 year low of C$27.75 and a 1 year high of C$36.25. The firm has a market cap of C$26.29 billion, a P/E ratio of 4.18, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.37. The company has a current ratio of 0.73, a quick ratio of 0.43 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 175.06. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of C$31.40 and a 200 day moving average price of C$32.32.

BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 6th. The company reported C$0.65 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. BCE had a net margin of 25.89% and a return on equity of 27.73%. The company had revenue of C$6.18 billion for the quarter. As a group, analysts expect that BCE will post 3.1120864 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director Louis Vachon acquired 10,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, September 18th. The shares were purchased at an average price of C$30.63 per share, for a total transaction of C$306,300.00. Following the purchase, the director owned 100,000 shares in the company, valued at C$3,063,000. This represents a 11.11% increase in their ownership of the stock. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

About BCE

Bell Media is Canada’s leading media and entertainment company with a portfolio of assets in premium video, audio, out-of-home advertising, and digital media. This includes Canada’s most-watched television network, CTV; the largest Canadian-owned video streamer, Crave, with a premium add-on to include STARZ; a powerful suite of specialty channels; the most-trusted news brand, CTV News; Canada’s cross-platform sports leaders, TSN and RDS; leading out-of-home advertising network, Astral; Québec’s fast-growing conventional French-language network, Noovo; the country’s leading radio and podcast app, iHeartRadio Canada; and a range of award-winning original productions, brands, and services.