Great Lakes Retirement Inc. Purchases 340 Shares of BCE Inc. (NYSE:BCE)

Great Lakes Retirement Inc. boosted its position in shares of BCE Inc. (NYSE:BCE) (TSE:BCE) by 1.6% in the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 21,963 shares of the utilities provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 340 shares during the period. Great Lakes Retirement Inc.’s holdings in BCE were worth $865,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Invesco Ltd. boosted its stake in shares of BCE by 6.0% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 1,928,620 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $73,615,000 after buying an additional 109,866 shares during the last quarter. National Bank of Canada FI lifted its stake in BCE by 2.1% in the 3rd quarter. National Bank of Canada FI now owns 15,712,011 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $575,871,000 after purchasing an additional 323,998 shares during the last quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its stake in BCE by 57.2% in the 3rd quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 2,318,302 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $88,908,000 after purchasing an additional 843,626 shares during the last quarter. Raymond James Trust N.A. lifted its stake in BCE by 1.5% in the 4th quarter. Raymond James Trust N.A. now owns 29,477 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $1,161,000 after purchasing an additional 431 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Claret Asset Management Corp lifted its stake in BCE by 54.2% in the 3rd quarter. Claret Asset Management Corp now owns 86,587 shares of the utilities provider’s stock valued at $3,307,000 after purchasing an additional 30,444 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 41.46% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have issued reports on BCE. TD Securities downgraded shares of BCE from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, February 2nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price objective on shares of BCE from $58.00 to $54.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 9th. Argus downgraded shares of BCE from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, March 4th. Finally, Barclays cut their price objective on shares of BCE from $40.00 to $38.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, February 12th. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $51.00.

BCE Stock Performance

Shares of BCE traded down $0.24 during mid-day trading on Thursday, hitting $34.02. 2,950,797 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,553,974. BCE Inc. has a 52 week low of $33.54 and a 52 week high of $48.38. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $37.66 and its 200-day simple moving average is $38.64. The firm has a market cap of $31.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.25, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.52 and a beta of 0.56. The company has a quick ratio of 0.61, a current ratio of 0.65 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.84.

BCE (NYSE:BCE) (TSE:BCE) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 8th. The utilities provider reported $0.56 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.54 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $4.76 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.82 billion. BCE had a net margin of 8.82% and a return on equity of 17.13%. On average, equities research analysts expect that BCE Inc. will post 2.36 EPS for the current year.

BCE Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 15th. Investors of record on Friday, March 15th will be paid a $0.742 dividend. This represents a $2.97 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 8.72%. This is a boost from BCE’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.70. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, March 14th. BCE’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 175.15%.

BCE Profile

BCE Inc, a communications company, provides wireless, wireline, Internet, and television (TV) services to residential, business, and wholesale customers in Canada. The company operates through three segments: Bell Wireless, Bell Wireline, and Bell Media. The Bell Wireless segment offers integrated digital wireless voice and data communication products and services, as well as consumer electronics products.