Short Interest in Nutrien Ltd. (NYSE:NTR) Rises By 89.5%

Nutrien Ltd. (NYSE:NTR) saw a large growth in short interest in June. As of June 15th, there was short interest totaling 5,310,769 shares, a growth of 89.5% from the May 31st total of 2,802,286 shares. Approximately 1.1% of the company’s stock are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 3,204,984 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 1.7 days.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts have recently commented on NTR shares. Oppenheimer raised their target price on Nutrien from $80.00 to $82.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 12th. Raymond James Financial raised Nutrien from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and upped their price target for the stock from $74.00 to $90.00 in a research note on Tuesday, May 5th. TD Securities reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Nutrien in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Weiss Ratings raised Nutrien from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research note on Monday, June 1st. Finally, Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on Nutrien from $77.00 to $93.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 8th. Thirteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seven have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, Nutrien has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $81.61.

Nutrien Stock Up 2.3%

Shares of Nutrien stock traded up $1.47 during trading hours on Thursday, reaching $65.04. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 2,858,300 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,349,996. The company has a market capitalization of $31.17 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.25, a P/E/G ratio of 0.58 and a beta of 0.62. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $68.40 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $69.59. Nutrien has a one year low of $53.03 and a one year high of $85.36. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.35, a quick ratio of 0.59 and a current ratio of 1.24.

Nutrien (NYSE:NTR) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, May 6th. The company reported $0.51 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.48 by $0.03. Nutrien had a net margin of 8.58% and a return on equity of 8.84%. The company had revenue of $6.05 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.30 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $0.11 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 18.5% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts forecast that Nutrien will post 5.45 earnings per share for the current year.

Nutrien Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, July 17th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, June 30th will be paid a $0.55 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, June 30th. This represents a $2.20 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 3.4%. Nutrien’s dividend payout ratio is 44.81%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Wellington Management Group LLP raised its position in Nutrien by 440.2% in the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 16,338,606 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,008,713,000 after buying an additional 13,313,817 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in Nutrien during the 4th quarter worth $412,635,000. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership boosted its holdings in Nutrien by 19.1% during the 3rd quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 14,221,381 shares of the company’s stock worth $834,962,000 after acquiring an additional 2,276,651 shares during the last quarter. TD Asset Management Inc grew its stake in shares of Nutrien by 21.2% in the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 8,928,534 shares of the company’s stock worth $551,821,000 after acquiring an additional 1,559,673 shares in the last quarter. Finally, DJE Kapital AG grew its stake in shares of Nutrien by 1,373.6% in the 1st quarter. DJE Kapital AG now owns 1,534,869 shares of the company’s stock worth $116,111,000 after acquiring an additional 1,430,708 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 63.10% of the company’s stock.

About Nutrien

Nutrien Ltd. is a global fertilizer and agricultural-services company headquartered in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. The company is publicly traded and operates across the farm input value chain, combining upstream fertilizer production with a broad retail and services platform aimed at supporting crop production worldwide. Nutrien’s business model integrates the manufacture and distribution of crop nutrients with on-the-ground agronomic support for growers and agricultural businesses.

Nutrien produces and supplies the three primary fertilizer nutrients—potash, nitrogen and phosphate—through its wholesale operations, and markets a wide range of crop inputs including seeds and crop protection products.