Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) Stock Rating Raised to Buy at Freedom Broker

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) was upgraded by research analysts at Freedom Broker from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report released on Thursday, Benzinga reports. The brokerage presently has a $40.00 target price on the oilfield services company’s stock, up from their previous target price of $37.00. Freedom Broker‘s target price points to a potential upside of 20.69% from the stock’s current price.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on HAL. UBS Group cut their price target on Halliburton from $42.00 to $41.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday. Wolfe Research assumed coverage on shares of Halliburton in a research report on Wednesday, July 8th. They set a “peer perform” rating for the company. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on shares of Halliburton from $41.00 to $40.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, July 22nd. Freedom Capital upgraded shares of Halliburton from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 22nd. Finally, Susquehanna cut their target price on shares of Halliburton from $45.00 to $42.00 and set a “positive” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Eighteen research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, six have given a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Halliburton currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $43.86.

Halliburton Trading Down 2.5%

Shares of Halliburton stock traded down $0.85 on Thursday, hitting $33.14. 14,286,805 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 12,971,064. Halliburton has a one year low of $24.92 and a one year high of $43.59. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.63, a current ratio of 2.02 and a quick ratio of 1.50. The company has a fifty day moving average of $34.22 and a two-hundred day moving average of $36.05. The company has a market capitalization of $27.61 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.87, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.94 and a beta of 0.83.

Halliburton (NYSE:HAL) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, October 20th. The oilfield services company reported $0.60 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.58 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $5.70 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $5.58 billion. Halliburton had a return on equity of 18.36% and a net margin of 8.90%. The firm’s revenue was up 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $0.58 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Halliburton will post 2.34 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Activity

In related news, COO Jeffrey Slocum sold 52,572 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, August 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $35.09, for a total value of $1,844,751.48. Following the sale, the chief operating officer directly owned 118,730 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,166,235.70. This trade represents a 30.69% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Company insiders own 0.57% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Bank of Nova Scotia increased its stake in Halliburton by 128.8% in the 1st quarter. Bank of Nova Scotia now owns 2,284,612 shares of the oilfield services company’s stock worth $89,077,000 after purchasing an additional 1,286,095 shares during the period. Private Advisory Group LLC purchased a new position in shares of Halliburton during the second quarter valued at about $10,443,000. Rokos Capital Management LLP bought a new position in shares of Halliburton in the 1st quarter worth approximately $34,741,000. Readystate Asset Management LP purchased a new position in Halliburton during the first quarter valued at $7,317,000. Finally, Liontrust Investment Partners LLP bought a new stake in Halliburton during the first quarter worth about $5,891,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 85.23% of the company’s stock.

Halliburton Company Profile

Halliburton Company (NYSE: HAL) is a global provider of products and services for the energy industry. The company supports the exploration, development, and production of oil and natural gas through technologies and services used throughout the life cycle of a well.

Halliburton operates through two primary business segments: Completion and Production, and Drilling and Evaluation. Its offerings include cementing, stimulation, well completion, production enhancement, drilling services, drilling fluids, well testing, wireline and perforating services, formation evaluation, and project management.