Penn Capital Management Company LLC Makes New Investment in Spire Inc. (NYSE:SR)

Posted by on Mar 17th, 2023

Penn Capital Management Company LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Spire Inc. (NYSE:SR – Get Rating) during the third quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor acquired 3,493 shares of the utilities provider’s stock, valued at approximately $218,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in SR. Wipfli Financial Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Spire during the third quarter valued at about $30,000. Private Trust Co. NA acquired a new stake in Spire in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $32,000. Quadrant Capital Group LLC increased its position in Spire by 47.1% in the 2nd quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 581 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $43,000 after buying an additional 186 shares during the period. Cohen & Steers Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Spire by 31.8% during the first quarter. Cohen & Steers Inc. now owns 639 shares of the utilities provider’s stock worth $46,000 after buying an additional 154 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Cowa LLC bought a new stake in shares of Spire in the third quarter valued at approximately $75,000. 99.86% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts recently commented on SR shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut shares of Spire from an “overweight” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $69.00 target price for the company. in a research note on Monday, December 5th. Bank of America cut shares of Spire from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $78.00 to $61.00 in a research note on Monday, December 12th. Mizuho boosted their price target on Spire from $69.00 to $73.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 7th. TheStreet upgraded Spire from a “c+” rating to a “b” rating in a research report on Friday, February 3rd. Finally, StockNews.com assumed coverage on Spire in a report on Thursday. They set a “hold” rating on the stock. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and nine have assigned a hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $70.25.

Spire Price Performance

Shares of SR stock opened at $71.06 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.20, a current ratio of 0.68 and a quick ratio of 0.52. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $71.39 and its 200 day simple moving average is $69.43. Spire Inc. has a one year low of $61.52 and a one year high of $79.24. The firm has a market cap of $3.73 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 15.35, a P/E/G ratio of 3.92 and a beta of 0.47.

Spire (NYSE:SR – Get Rating) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, February 1st. The utilities provider reported $1.55 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.06 by $0.49. Spire had a net margin of 10.42% and a return on equity of 9.18%. The business had revenue of $814.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $561.35 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $1.14 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 46.6% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts expect that Spire Inc. will post 4.24 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Spire Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 4th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 10th will be issued a $0.72 dividend. This is an increase from Spire’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.14. This represents a $2.88 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.05%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, March 9th. Spire’s payout ratio is presently 62.20%.

Spire Profile

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Spire Inc operates as a public utility holding company, which provides natural gas service through its utility operations while engaging in non-regulated activities. It operates through the Gas Utility and Gas Marketing Business segments. The Gas Utility segment includes the regulated operations of Laclede Gas Company and Alabama Gas Corporation.

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Institutional Ownership by Quarter for Spire (NYSE:SR)

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