Heartland Express, Inc. (NASDAQ:HTLD – Get Rating) Director Michael John Sullivan purchased 2,000 shares of Heartland Express in a trade dated Wednesday, September 7. The shares were acquired at an average cost of $14.28 per share, with a total value of $28,560.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now directly owns 14,902 shares of the company, valued at approximately $212,800.56. The purchase was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, accessible via this hyperlink.

Heartland Express Price Performance

HTLD traded $0.47 on Friday, hitting $14.75. 216,674 shares of the company were traded, against an average volume of 279,737. The company has a debt ratio of 0.04, a quick ratio of 2.34 and a current ratio of 2.34. The company’s 50-day moving average is $15.18 and its 200-day moving average is $14.41. Heartland Express, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $12.78 and a fifty-two week high of $17.88. The company has a market capitalization of $1.16 billion, a P/E ratio of 8.16 and a beta of 0.56.

Heartland Express (NASDAQ:HTLD – Get Rating) last released its results on Monday, July 25. The transportation company reported earnings per share of $0.97 for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.33 by $0.64. Heartland Express had a net margin of 21.64% and a return on equity of 18.49%. The company posted revenue of $187.20 million for the quarter, versus analyst estimates of $164.27 million. In the same period a year earlier, the company posted earnings of $0.26 per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter increased by 21.5% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts expect Heartland Express, Inc. to post EPS of 1.83 for the current year.

Heartland Express Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, July 7. Shareholders of record on Monday, June 27 received a dividend of $0.02 per share. The ex-dividend date was Friday, June 24. This represents an annualized dividend of $0.08 and a yield of 0.54%. Heartland Express’ payout rate is currently 4.57%.

Changes to analyst ratings

A number of brokerages have recently commented on HTLD. Robert W. Baird raised his price target on Heartland Express shares from $14.00 to $17.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a Tuesday, August 23 report. StockNews.com moved shares of Heartland Express from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a Wednesday, August 17, report. UBS Group raised its price target on shares of Heartland Express to $16.00 in a Tuesday, July 26 report. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised its price target on shares of Heartland Express from $16.00 to $17.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a Monday, August 29 report. One financial analyst gave the stock a sell rating and four gave the stock a hold rating. According to MarketBeat.com, Heartland Express has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $15.83.

Institutional entries and exits

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently increased or reduced their stake in HTLD. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its position in Heartland Express by 1,321.3% during the fourth quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 496,678 shares of the transportation company worth $8,354,000 after purchasing an additional 461,732 shares during the period. American Century Companies Inc. increased its position in Heartland Express shares by 2.9% in the first quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 8,127,716 shares of the transportation company valued at $114,357,000 after purchasing an additional 226,297 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. increased its position in Heartland Express shares by 55.0% in the second quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 437,415 shares of the transportation company valued at $6,084,000 after buying an additional 155,263 shares in the last quarter. Keeley Teton Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Heartland Express in the first quarter valued at approximately $1,994,000. Finally, Bank of America Corp DE increased its position in Heartland Express shares by 118.5% in the first quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 258,327 shares of the transportation company valued at $3,635,000 after buying an additional 140,081 shares in the last quarter. 55.31% of the shares are currently held by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Heartland Express Company Profile

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Heartland Express, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, operates as a short to medium haul truckload carrier in the United States and Canada. It primarily provides national, asset-based dry van loading service for shippers from Washington to Florida and New England to California; and temperature-controlled truckload services.

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