Service Properties Trust (NASDAQ:SVC) Sees Significant Decrease in Short Interest

Service Properties Trust (NASDAQ:SVC) saw a significant decrease in short interest in the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 3,930,000 shares, a decrease of 62.5% from the December 15th total of 10,470,000 shares. Based on an average daily volume of 3,570,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 1.1 days. Approximately 2.6% of the shares of the company are sold short.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Service Properties Trust

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Choreo LLC bought a new stake in Service Properties Trust during the 2nd quarter valued at $54,000. Texas Permanent School Fund Corp lifted its position in shares of Service Properties Trust by 25.5% during the second quarter. Texas Permanent School Fund Corp now owns 182,043 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $936,000 after buying an additional 36,963 shares during the last quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP boosted its holdings in shares of Service Properties Trust by 3.6% in the 2nd quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 2,436,369 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $12,522,000 after buying an additional 85,791 shares in the last quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC grew its position in shares of Service Properties Trust by 17.9% in the 2nd quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC now owns 128,171 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $654,000 after buying an additional 19,416 shares during the last quarter. Finally, MQS Management LLC purchased a new stake in Service Properties Trust during the second quarter valued at approximately $89,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 77.62% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, Wells Fargo & Company cut their price objective on Service Properties Trust from $3.00 to $2.75 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, December 9th.

Service Properties Trust Price Performance

SVC stock traded up $0.02 during trading on Tuesday, hitting $2.62. 359,567 shares of the company’s stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,728,842. The stock has a market capitalization of $436.62 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -1.78 and a beta of 2.19. Service Properties Trust has a 52 week low of $2.29 and a 52 week high of $8.15. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.32, a quick ratio of 0.03 and a current ratio of 0.03. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $2.69 and a 200 day simple moving average of $4.00.

Service Properties Trust (NASDAQ:SVC) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The real estate investment trust reported ($0.28) earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.37 by ($0.65). Service Properties Trust had a negative net margin of 12.87% and a negative return on equity of 22.67%. The company had revenue of $491.17 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $497.97 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.56 EPS. As a group, research analysts expect that Service Properties Trust will post 1.13 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Service Properties Trust Cuts Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, November 14th. Shareholders of record on Monday, October 28th were given a dividend of $0.01 per share. This represents a $0.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.53%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, October 28th. Service Properties Trust’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently -2.72%.

About Service Properties Trust

Service Properties Trust (Nasdaq: SVC) is a real estate investment trust with over $11 billion invested in two asset categories: hotels and service-focused retail net lease properties. As of December 31, 2023, SVC owned 221 hotels with over 37,000 guest rooms throughout the United States and in Puerto Rico and Canada, the majority of which are extended stay and select service.