Advisors Asset Management Inc. Grows Stake in Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC)

Advisors Asset Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Hercules Capital, Inc. (NYSE:HTGC) by 9.3% in the third quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 406,985 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 34,718 shares during the period. Advisors Asset Management Inc.’s holdings in Hercules Capital were worth $7,993,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Wedbush Securities Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Hercules Capital by 3.8% during the 2nd quarter. Wedbush Securities Inc. now owns 15,689 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $321,000 after acquiring an additional 569 shares during the last quarter. RMR Wealth Builders lifted its stake in Hercules Capital by 3.5% in the second quarter. RMR Wealth Builders now owns 16,997 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $348,000 after purchasing an additional 571 shares during the last quarter. Founders Financial Alliance LLC lifted its stake in Hercules Capital by 2.3% in the second quarter. Founders Financial Alliance LLC now owns 28,028 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $573,000 after purchasing an additional 627 shares during the last quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. lifted its stake in Hercules Capital by 2.7% in the third quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 27,319 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $540,000 after purchasing an additional 711 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Arkadios Wealth Advisors lifted its stake in Hercules Capital by 1.6% in the third quarter. Arkadios Wealth Advisors now owns 55,802 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,096,000 after purchasing an additional 900 shares during the last quarter. 19.69% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

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

Hercules Capital Price Performance

Shares of NYSE HTGC opened at $18.81 on Thursday. Hercules Capital, Inc. has a 1 year low of $15.14 and a 1 year high of $21.78. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.94, a current ratio of 1.61 and a quick ratio of 1.61. The company’s 50-day moving average is $19.66 and its 200 day moving average is $19.69. The stock has a market capitalization of $3.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 9.31 and a beta of 1.39.

Hercules Capital (NYSE:HTGC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The financial services provider reported $0.51 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.51. The company had revenue of $125.25 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $125.80 million. Hercules Capital had a net margin of 65.07% and a return on equity of 17.88%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $0.52 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts expect that Hercules Capital, Inc. will post 2.02 earnings per share for the current year.

Hercules Capital Announces Dividend

The firm 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. This represents a $1.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 10.21%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, November 13th. Hercules Capital’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 79.21%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms have weighed in on HTGC. Piper Sandler boosted their price target on shares of Hercules Capital from $22.00 to $22.50 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, August 2nd. JMP Securities upped their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $20.00 to $22.00 and gave the company a “market outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 30th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company upped their price objective on shares of Hercules Capital from $20.00 to $21.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 29th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $19.83.

About Hercules Capital

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.