Gamco Investors INC. ET AL Buys New Shares in Essential Utilities Inc. $WTRG

Gamco Investors INC. ET AL bought a new stake in Essential Utilities Inc. (NYSE:WTRG) during the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm bought 58,487 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,244,000.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of WTRG. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its position in shares of Essential Utilities by 587.6% in the third quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 4,071,929 shares of the company’s stock valued at $162,472,000 after acquiring an additional 3,479,762 shares during the last quarter. ANTIPODES PARTNERS Ltd bought a new position in Essential Utilities during the third quarter worth about $128,137,000. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. grew its holdings in Essential Utilities by 1,572.4% during the second quarter. Balyasny Asset Management L.P. now owns 1,271,201 shares of the company’s stock worth $47,212,000 after purchasing an additional 1,195,189 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in Essential Utilities by 121.8% during the third quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,591,706 shares of the company’s stock worth $62,697,000 after purchasing an additional 873,990 shares during the period. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. grew its holdings in Essential Utilities by 2.8% during the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 31,246,084 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,246,719,000 after purchasing an additional 838,450 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 74.78% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently commented on WTRG. UBS Group set a $41.00 price target on Essential Utilities in a report on Thursday, May 7th. Argus upgraded Essential Utilities to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Monday, March 23rd. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, one has given a Buy rating, five have given a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $42.40.

Essential Utilities Trading Up 1.2%

Shares of NYSE:WTRG opened at $37.00 on Friday. Essential Utilities Inc. has a 12-month low of $36.32 and a 12-month high of $42.37. The stock has a market cap of $10.49 billion, a PE ratio of 18.78 and a beta of 0.67. The business has a 50 day moving average of $39.39 and a 200-day moving average of $39.08. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.21.

Essential Utilities (NYSE:WTRG) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 7th. The company reported $0.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.90 by ($0.07). Essential Utilities had a return on equity of 8.34% and a net margin of 21.82%.The firm had revenue of $861.76 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $782.90 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $1.03 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 10.0% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Essential Utilities Inc. will post 2.25 earnings per share for the current year.

Essential Utilities Profile

Essential Utilities, Inc, formerly known as Aqua America, is a publicly traded water and natural gas utility holding company. Through its regulated water and wastewater subsidiaries, the company provides essential water services to residential, commercial and industrial customers. In addition, Essential Utilities delivers natural gas distribution services in Pennsylvania through its Peoples Gas subsidiary, offering integrated utility solutions under a unified corporate framework.

The company traces its roots to the Philadelphia Suburban Water Company, founded in 1886 to serve growing communities outside Philadelphia.