The Vanguard Group, Inc. recently announced the acquisition of new stake in FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE:FE). The institutional investor has increased its shareholding in the Utilities company by 0.99% to 64.3 million shares with purchase of 0.63 million shares. This fresh investment now brings its stake to 11.24% valued currently at $2.54 billion. In addition, BlackRock Fund Advisors raised its holdings by 33882.0 to 34.96 million shares.
With over 4.26 million FirstEnergy Corp. (FE) shares trading Friday and a closing price of $38.09 on the day, the dollar volume was approximately $162.27 million. The shares have shown a negative half year performance of -7.17% and its price on 03/10/23 lost nearly -2.71%. Currently, there are 572.25M common shares owned by the public and among those 571.68M shares have been available to trade.
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An analysis of what Wall Street brokers have to say about the expected price targets for this stock gives us this picture: 16 analysts who have offered their price forecasts for FE have a consensus price objective of $44.07. The analysts have set the share’s price value over the next 12 months at a high of $48.00 and a low of $38.00. The average price target is 14.04% above its recent price level and a downside to the estimated low will see the stock lose -0.24% over that period. But an upside of 20.65% will see the stock hit the forecast high price target while median target price for the stock is $45.00.
Insiders at the company have transacted a total of 12 times over the past 12 months, according to data filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). 9 of these insider trades were purchases, accounting for 143,963 shares. Insider sales of the common stock occurred on 3 occasions, with total insider shares sold totaling 40,412 shares.
The top 3 mutual fund holders in FirstEnergy Corp. are Vanguard Total Stock Market Index, Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund, and Vanguard 500 Index Fund. Vanguard Total Stock Market Index owns 16.62 million shares of the company’s stock, all valued at over $657.11 million. The company bought an additional 0.1 million shares recently to bring their total holdings to about 2.90% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard Mid Cap Index Fund bought 20342.0 shares to see its total holdings expand to 12.67 million shares valued at over $500.9 million and representing 2.21% of the shares outstanding. Vanguard 500 Index Fund bought 29822.0 shares to bring its total holdings to over 12.59 million shares at a value of $497.62 million. Vanguard 500 Index Fund now owns shares totaling to 2.20% of the shares outstanding.
Shares of FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE) opened at $39.16, up $0.01 from a prior closing price of $39.15. However, the script later moved the day high at 39.23, down -2.71%. The company’s stock has a 5-day price change of -4.20% and -8.66% over the past three months. FE shares are trading -9.18% year to date (YTD), with the 12-month market performance down to -13.59% lower. It has a 12-month low price of $35.32 and touched a high of $48.85 over the same period. FE has an average intraday trading volume of 3.68 million shares. The stock is trading above its simple moving averages at the SMA20, SMA50, and SMA200, as the current price level is off by -4.40%, -6.90%, and -4.14% respectively.
Institutional ownership of FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE) shares accounts for 89.00% of the company’s 572.25M shares outstanding. Mutual fund holders own 42.00%, while other institutional holders and individual stakeholders account for 44.41% and 0.58% respectively.
It has a market capitalization of $22.40B and a beta (3y monthly) value of 0.43. The stock’s trailing 12-month PE ratio is 53.72, while the earnings-per-share (ttm) stands at $0.71. The company has a PEG of 97.50 and a Quick Ratio of 0.50 with the debt-to-equity ratio at 2.13. Price movements for the stock have been influenced by the stock’s volatility, which stands at 2.35% over the week and 2.04% over the month.
Analysts forecast that FirstEnergy Corp. (FE) will achieve an EPS of $0.53 for the current quarter, $0.55 for the next quarter and $2.47 for 2023. The lowest estimate earnings-per-share for the quarter is $0.5 while analysts give the company a high EPS estimate of $0.56. Comparatively, EPS for the current quarter was $0.51 a year ago. Earnings per share for the fiscal year are expected to decrease by -68.70%, and 6.32% over the next financial year. EPS should grow at an annualized rate of 0.55% over the next five years, compared to -19.00% over the past 5-year period.
If you are looking to buy this stock, then you may note that the average analyst recommendation by 16 brokerage firm advisors rate FirstEnergy Corp. (FE) as a “Moderate Buy” at a consensus score of 2.40. Specifically, 9 Wall Street analysts polled rate the stock as a buy, while 6 of the 16 advise that investors “hold,” and 0 rated it as a “Sell.”
Looking at the support for the FE, a number of firms have released research notes about the stock. Guggenheim stated their Buy rating for the stock in a research note on January 23, 2023, with the firm’s price target at $34-$46. BofA Securities coverage for the FirstEnergy Corp. (FE) stock in a research note released on January 23, 2023 offered a Underperform rating with a price target of $38. BofA Securities was of a view on May 16, 2022 that the stock is Neutral, while Credit Suisse gave the stock Outperform rating on April 26, 2022, issuing a price target of $51. Evercore ISI on their part issued Outperform rating on January 07, 2022.
