Investors Purchase Large Volume of Call Options on AT&T (NYSE:T)

AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) saw unusually large options trading on Thursday. Stock traders acquired 73,816 call options on the stock. This is an increase of approximately 35% compared to the average daily volume of 54,852 call options.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of AT&T by 1.6% during the second quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 661,355,210 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $19,139,620,000 after purchasing an additional 10,310,560 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp lifted its stake in shares of AT&T by 2.4% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 321,070,509 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $9,291,781,000 after purchasing an additional 7,404,376 shares in the last quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC acquired a new position in shares of AT&T during the second quarter worth about $5,266,758,000. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of AT&T by 1.2% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 172,039,872 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $4,958,066,000 after purchasing an additional 2,066,026 shares in the last quarter. Finally, GQG Partners LLC lifted its stake in shares of AT&T by 17.7% during the first quarter. GQG Partners LLC now owns 113,957,259 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $3,222,711,000 after purchasing an additional 17,177,874 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 57.10% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms have weighed in on T. Raymond James Financial reissued a “strong-buy” rating and set a $33.00 price target (up previously from $31.00) on shares of AT&T in a research report on Thursday, September 18th. Sanford C. Bernstein raised their price objective on AT&T from $31.00 to $32.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, September 4th. Citigroup restated a “buy” rating on shares of AT&T in a report on Tuesday, August 26th. Hsbc Global Res cut AT&T from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, July 24th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group assumed coverage on AT&T in a report on Tuesday, September 2nd. They set a “buy” rating and a $32.00 price objective on the stock. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seventeen have assigned a Buy rating and six have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $30.74.

AT&T Price Performance

Shares of AT&T stock opened at $27.06 on Friday. AT&T has a twelve month low of $21.05 and a twelve month high of $29.79. The stock has a market capitalization of $193.49 billion, a P/E ratio of 15.38, a PEG ratio of 3.46 and a beta of 0.42. The company has a current ratio of 0.81, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.01. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $28.60 and its 200 day moving average price is $27.91.

AT&T (NYSE:T) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, July 23rd. The technology company reported $0.54 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.53 by $0.01. AT&T had a return on equity of 13.36% and a net margin of 10.29%.The firm had revenue of $30.85 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $30.44 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $0.51 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 3.4% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts anticipate that AT&T will post 2.14 earnings per share for the current year.

AT&T Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, November 3rd. Investors of record on Friday, October 10th will be issued a $0.2775 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 10th. This represents a $1.11 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.1%. AT&T’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 63.07%.

About AT&T

AT&T, Inc is a holding company, which engages in the provision of telecommunications and technology services. It operates through the Communications and Latin America segments. The Communications segment offers wireless, wireline telecom, and broadband services to businesses and consumers located in the US and businesses globally.