4. Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 88
Number of Years of Consecutive Dividend Increases: 14
Dividend Yield: 1.7%
Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) is a communication services company operating in the cable and satellite industry. The company operates national cable networks to provide entertainment content, news, and sports content, and some of its broadcast networks include NBC and Telemundo. It ranks 4th on our list of stocks with over 10 years of dividend increases.
Raymond James has raised its price target on Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) shares from $63 to $65 as of this July, with analyst Frank Louthan also keeping an Outperform rating on the stock.
In the first quarter of 2021, Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) had an EPS of $0.76, beating estimates by $0.18. The company’s revenue was $27.20 billion, up 2.24% year over year and also beating estimates by $465.18 million. Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) has gained about 18.76% in the past 6 months and 14.45% year to date as well.
By the end of the first quarter of 2021, 88 hedge funds out of the 866 tracked by Insider Monkey held stakes in Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) worth roughly $9.76 billion. This is compared to 84 hedge funds in the previous quarter with stakes worth approximately $8.83 billion.
ClearBridge Investments, an investment management firm, mentioned Comcast Corporation (NASDAQ: CMCSA) in its second-quarter 2021 investor letter. Here’s what they said:
“We funded the shift primarily with trims in Comcast following big gains in this name. Comcast is a long-term holding that have been and remain core holdings. During the quarter, however, we took gains and resized the positions to reflect their current risk-reward post strong increases in the stocks.
Comcast, like Blackstone, has been a meaningful long-term holding whose stock performance has at times lagged its robust fundamental performance. Over the last nine months the stock price caught up some with the fundamentals and looked like it had more room to run. Our thesis on the name evolved, however, following the May 17 announcement that competitor Discovery was merging its operations with Time Warner. This deal positions the new company as a credible competitor to Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and Disney, and results in Comcast being left without the proverbial dance partner in the evolving pay TV/DTC landscape. While we continue to believe Comcast’s cable systems business is well-positioned and that NBCUniversal remains valuable, the competitive dynamic for NBCUniversal has stiffened. Our reduced position size reflects both our continued enthusiasm for many parts of the franchise and emerging concerns given the evolving pay TV/DTC landscape.”
