H World Group (NASDAQ:HTHT) Upgraded at Wall Street Zen

Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of H World Group (NASDAQ:HTHT) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a research note released on Saturday,Wall Street Zen reports.

HTHT has been the subject of several other reports. Zacks Research lowered H World Group from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, June 4th. Weiss Ratings raised H World Group from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 26th. Finally, Benchmark reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of H World Group in a research note on Tuesday, August 18th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $61.20.

H World Group Stock Performance

NASDAQ HTHT opened at $45.77 on Friday. H World Group has a 52-week low of $36.48 and a 52-week high of $56.63. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $43.68 and a 200 day simple moving average of $47.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.44, a quick ratio of 1.20 and a current ratio of 1.21. The company has a market capitalization of $14.08 billion, a PE ratio of 20.16, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.63 and a beta of 0.15.

H World Group (NASDAQ:HTHT) last released its earnings results on Monday, August 17th. The company reported $0.78 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.74 by $0.04. H World Group had a net margin of 18.90% and a return on equity of 41.05%. The firm had revenue of $1.05 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $998.88 million. On average, research analysts predict that H World Group will post 2.6 EPS for the current year.

H World Group Cuts Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, September 22nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, September 8th will be issued a $0.87 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, September 8th. This represents a yield of 380.0%. H World Group’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 112.78%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On H World Group

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the business. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of H World Group by 11.2% in the first quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 9,319 shares of the company’s stock valued at $338,000 after purchasing an additional 936 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in H World Group during the 2nd quarter worth about $888,000. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its stake in H World Group by 81.0% in the 2nd quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 1,450 shares of the company’s stock worth $49,000 after purchasing an additional 649 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP bought a new position in H World Group in the 2nd quarter worth about $2,881,000. Finally, Jump Financial LLC purchased a new position in H World Group during the 2nd quarter valued at about $651,000. Institutional investors own 46.41% of the company’s stock.

About H World Group

H World Group, formerly known as Huazhu Group, is a leading hotel management and franchising company primarily serving the China market. The company operates a broad portfolio of midscale to luxury hotel brands, including Hi Inn, Blossom, Manxin, Madison International, Joya, Grand Mercure, Novotel, Mercure and ibis. Through a network of both directly managed and franchised properties, H World Group caters to business and leisure travelers by offering consistent service standards and loyalty benefits across its brands.

In addition to its core hotel operations, H World Group provides technology-driven hospitality solutions such as centralized reservation systems, revenue management platforms and customer relationship management tools.