HighTower Advisors LLC Has $1.23 Million Stock Position in Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC)

HighTower Advisors LLC reduced its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) by 6.7% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 62,435 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 4,489 shares during the period. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Hercules Capital were worth $1,228,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. Tectonic Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Hercules Capital by 17.0% during the third quarter. Tectonic Advisors LLC now owns 433,032 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $8,505,000 after purchasing an additional 62,826 shares in the last quarter. Mackenzie Financial Corp lifted its position in shares of Hercules Capital by 77.0% during the second quarter. Mackenzie Financial Corp now owns 31,632 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $647,000 after purchasing an additional 13,765 shares in the last quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets lifted its position in shares of Hercules Capital by 511.2% during the third quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 53,068 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,042,000 after purchasing an additional 44,386 shares in the last quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Hercules Capital by 9.3% during the third quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 406,985 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $7,993,000 after purchasing an additional 34,718 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Envestnet Asset Management Inc. lifted its position in shares of Hercules Capital by 25.6% during the second quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 186,835 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $3,821,000 after purchasing an additional 38,131 shares in the last quarter. 19.69% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have commented on HTGC. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised shares of Hercules Capital from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and lifted their price objective for the stock from $19.50 to $21.50 in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. JMP Securities reaffirmed a “market outperform” rating and issued a $22.00 price objective on shares of Hercules Capital in a research report on Friday, December 6th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $20.00 to $21.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $20.90.

Hercules Capital Price Performance

HTGC stock opened at $19.24 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.94, a current ratio of 1.61 and a quick ratio of 1.61. Hercules Capital, Inc. has a one year low of $15.83 and a one year high of $21.78. The stock has a market cap of $3.12 billion, a PE ratio of 9.52 and a beta of 1.36. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $19.47 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $19.65.

Hercules Capital (NYSE:HTGC) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 30th. The financial services provider reported $0.51 earnings per share for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.51. The firm had revenue of $125.25 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $125.80 million. Hercules Capital had a net margin of 65.07% and a return on equity of 17.88%. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $0.52 EPS. On average, analysts predict that Hercules Capital, Inc. will post 2.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Hercules Capital Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, November 20th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, November 13th were issued a $0.48 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, November 13th. This represents a $1.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 9.98%. Hercules Capital’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 79.21%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Scott Bluestein sold 100,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, September 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $19.59, for a total value of $1,959,000.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,161,207 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $42,338,045.13. This represents a 4.42 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Company insiders own 1.90% of the company’s stock.

Hercules Capital Company Profile

Hercules Capital, Inc is a business development company. The firm specializing in providing venture debt, debt, senior secured loans, and growth capital to privately held venture capital-backed companies at all stages of development from startups to expansion stage including select publicly listed companies and select special opportunity lower middle market companies that require additional capital to fund acquisitions, recapitalizations and refinancing and established-stage companies.