Hawaiian Electric Industries (HE) Stock Soars on S&P 600 Inclusion – Latest News, Maui Settlement Update and 2026 Forecasts

Hawaiian Electric Industries, Inc. (NYSE: HE) is back in the headlines. After spending more than a year under intense pressure from the 2023 Maui wildfires and multi-billion-dollar legal risks, HE stock just logged a sharp rally driven by a powerful technical catalyst: inclusion in a major equity index.

As of December 9, 2025, Hawaiian Electric Industries stock trades around $11.73 per share, giving the company a market capitalization of roughly $2.1 billion. At the same time, the company is moving closer to finalizing a $4+ billion global settlement tied to the Maui fires, while analysts remain cautious with a consensus rating around “Hold” and modest downside in one-year price targets. ^[1]

Here’s a detailed breakdown of what’s driving HE right now and how the latest news, forecasts and analyses fit together as of December 9, 2025.

Index Effect: HE Jumps on S&P SmallCap 600 Inclusion

On December 8, 2025, Hawaiian Electric Industries stock spiked in double-digit fashion after S&P Dow Jones Indices announced that HE will be added to the S&P SmallCap 600 index as part of its latest quarterly rebalancing. The change is scheduled to take effect before the start of trading on December 22, 2025. ^[2]

A recent analysis republished on Nasdaq notes that HE shares were up about 11% intraday as traders reacted to the upcoming index inclusion. The article frames this as a classic case of the so-called “index effect”: once a stock is added to a widely followed benchmark, index funds and benchmark-hugging managers are effectively forced buyers. ^[3]

MarketBeat’s real-time note on the same trading session shows how dramatic the move was in price terms: HE gapped up from about $11.25 to $11.95 in pre-market trading and last changed hands around $12.60 during the day, with volume of roughly 1.4 million shares — notably above typical levels. ^[4]

Key points from the index-effect story:

HE will join S&P SmallCap 600 in the December rebalancing.
The December 8 session saw double-digit intraday gains after the announcement. ^[5]
The catalyst is technical rather than fundamental: nothing about the company’s operations changed because of index membership.

For investors, the takeaway is that the latest spike is driven primarily by mechanical index demand and sentiment, not by a fresh earnings surprise or a sudden improvement in wildfire risk.

Where HE Stands Today: Price, Valuation and Momentum

As of late trading on December 9, 2025, HE stock sits near $11.73, off the intraday highs but still well above pre-announcement levels.

MarketBeat’s snapshot of the company highlights some unusual valuation metrics for what is normally a slow-moving utility:

Market cap: about $2.15 billion.
P/E ratio: around 155x, inflated because GAAP earnings are still depressed following massive wildfire-related charges in 2024. ^[6]
Debt-to-equity ratio: roughly 1.79, reflecting a leveraged capital structure. ^[7]

On the technical side, Investor’s Business Daily recently flagged that Hawaiian Electric’s Relative Strength (RS) Rating — a proprietary measure that compares a stock’s performance to the broader market — has climbed from 65 to 71, signaling improving momentum but still not elite performance. ^[8]

Putting it simply: HE has stopped being a pure “disaster trade,” but it isn’t yet a market darling either. Price and momentum have recovered, yet fundamentals and risk remain complicated.

Maui Wildfire Settlement: A $4.037 Billion Overhang Moving Toward Resolution

Everything about Hawaiian Electric Industries in 2025 still orbits the gravitational field of the 2023 Maui wildfires.

The $4 Billion Global Settlement

A $4.037 billion global settlement has been negotiated among Hawaiian Electric, other defendants, and the State of Hawaiʻi to compensate victims of the August 2023 fires. According to Hawaiʻi Public Radio and settlement documents, about 97% of that total is earmarked for individual plaintiffs, while 3% — roughly $135 million — funds the class action pool. ^[9]

The global settlement structure includes:

Individual settlement fund: for those filing personal claims (severe injuries, wrongful death, major property loss, business damage, etc.).
Class settlement fund (~$135 million): covering a broad group including residents, businesses and even tourists affected by evacuations or trip cancellations. ^[10]

Key Deadlines and Court Dates

The class-action portion of the settlement is now in the final approval phase:

Claim deadline for class members: December 22, 2025. ^[11]
Final approval hearing for the class settlement: January 8, 2026, in Hawaii state court. ^[12]

Hawaiian Electric’s own Q3 2025 earnings release notes that the tort litigation settlement is advancing toward final court approval, and that the company’s base case assumes the first settlement payment will not occur before Q1 2026. ^[13]

Supreme Court Ruling Favors Settlement Progress

Earlier in 2025, a major legal milestone arrived when the Hawaii Supreme Court ruled that once the global settlement is final, participating insurers cannot separately sue parties blamed for the wildfires. Reuters reports that Hawaiian Electric welcomed the decision as “favorable,” noting that it improves clarity around the company’s path to “re-establishing financial stability.” ^[14]

The market’s reaction then was telling: HE shares rose about 6% in pre-market trading on that February 2025 ruling. ^[15]

In short, the legal risk hasn’t vanished, but the path from chaotic litigation to structured settlement is now visible. That’s a crucial backdrop for any HE stock forecast.

Q3 2025 Earnings: Back to Profitability, Still Carrying Wildfire Costs

On November 7, 2025, Hawaiian Electric Industries reported third-quarter 2025 results that show a return to profitability — but also ongoing wildfire-related drag. ^[16]

From the company’s earnings release:

Q3 2025 net income: about $31 million, or $0.18 per share, versus a loss in the prior-year quarter.
Core income from continuing operations (excluding wildfire-related costs and Pacific Current strategic review expenses): $33 million, or $0.19 per share, versus $33 million, or $0.29, a year earlier. ^[17]
Revenue: roughly $790.6 million, down from about $833.2 million in Q3 2024. ^[18]

The electric utility segment (Hawaiian Electric) swung from a net loss of about $83 million in Q3 2024 to net income of roughly $37 million in Q3 2025, largely because 2024’s results included massive wildfire liability accruals. ^[19]

Management’s commentary emphasized three themes:

Wildfire safety strategy
The utility continues to roll out a comprehensive wildfire safety strategy, including grid hardening, vegetation management and operational changes designed to reduce ignition risk. ^[20]
Liquidity and balance sheet repair
In September 2025, HE expanded its credit facility from $375 million to $600 million and completed about $500 million of new debt issuance, boosting liquidity and providing funding for “generation, safety, reliability and resilience” investments. ^[21]
Settlement timing
The company reiterated that, in its base case, the first cash outflows for the settlement are expected no earlier than Q1 2026, aligning with the January 8, 2026 approval timeline. ^[22]

From an equity-analysis perspective, Q3 2025 confirms that the core utility is still capable of generating profit, but headline earnings will remain distorted until wildfire charges are fully behind the company.

Analyst Ratings and HE Stock Forecasts for 2026

Analyst coverage of Hawaiian Electric remains cautious and fragmented, which is exactly what you’d expect from a stock sitting between index-inclusion euphoria and multi-billion-dollar liability reality.

Street Consensus

Different data providers show slightly different numbers, but the pattern is consistent:

Consensus rating: “Hold”.
Average 12-month price target: typically clustered around $11–$12.5 per share, implying limited upside — or even modest downside — from current levels. ^[23]

For example:

StockAnalysis reports an average target of about $11.5, with a low estimate of $10 and a high estimate of $12.5, implying a single-digit percentage downside vs. recent prices. ^[24]
TradingView lists a consensus target near $11, with a similar $10–$12 range. ^[25]
MarketBeat’s coverage cites a consensus price target of roughly $12.13, based on 1 Buy, 3 Hold and 1 Sell ratings. ^[26]

In other words, Wall Street is not forecasting a heroic comeback rally here; the average case is “stability with noise,” not a moonshot.

Recent Rating Changes

The December 8 MarketBeat note highlights two recent calls: ^[27]

Jefferies trimmed its price target from $12.25 to $12.00 and maintained a Hold rating.
Weiss Ratings reiterated a Sell (D) rating.

Analysts also expect Hawaiian Electric to deliver full-year EPS of about $1.71, which is enough to justify the dividend and support the balance sheet, but not enough to make the current P/E look “cheap” in a conventional sense. ^[28]

Key Risks Still Hanging Over HE Stock

Even with the recent index-driven pop, Hawaiian Electric Industries remains a high-risk, special-situation utility rather than a sleepy “bond proxy” stock.

Some of the major risk vectors:

Settlement Execution and Residual Litigation
- The global settlement is huge and complex. While the Hawaii Supreme Court ruling and January 2026 approval hearing are positive signs, delays or appeals could still introduce volatility. ^[29]
- There is always a possibility of non-settling plaintiffs or new legal theories creating additional liabilities at the margin.
Balance Sheet and Leverage
- HE’s debt-to-equity ratio near 1.8 and recently expanded credit facility underscore that the company is heavily reliant on debt markets. ^[30]
- While the new $500 million debt issuance and $600 million credit line improve liquidity, they also lock in higher interest costs in a world that still hasn’t fully returned to ultra-low rates.
Regulatory and Political Risk
- As a regulated utility serving about 95% of Hawaiʻi’s population, Hawaiian Electric operates under close oversight by the state’s Public Utilities Commission and elected officials. ^[31]
- Future wildfire-related legislation and safety mandates may dictate how much cost can be passed through to ratepayers versus absorbed by shareholders — a central axis of long-term valuation.
Climate and Wildfire Exposure
- The Maui fires were not a one-off in a vacuum; they sit inside a larger trend of climate-driven wildfire risk. That means that, even after the current settlement, investors must consider future event risk and how robust the wildfire safety strategy truly is.

Why HE Is Back on Watchlists – But Still Not a Conventional Utility Play

So how do all these moving pieces fit together?

Short-term narrative (next months)
HE’s inclusion in the S&P SmallCap 600 is likely to support the stock near term, as index funds complete their buying and traders ride the index effect. Volatility, however, can cut both ways once that buying is done. ^[32]
Medium-term narrative (2026)
The big hinge is the January 8, 2026 final approval hearing, followed by the timing and structure of the first settlement payments and how rating agencies treat HE’s post-settlement leverage and risk profile. If management executes its wildfire safety strategy and the settlement behaves as modeled, HE has a plausible path back to being a more conventional income-oriented utility, albeit at a lower valuation than pre-fires. ^[33]
Long-term narrative (beyond 2026)
Hawaiian Electric’s core business — providing power to multiple islands and supporting Hawaiʻi’s decarbonization and grid-modernization agenda — remains structurally important. The question for long-term shareholders is whether they are being compensated for the persistent climate, legal and regulatory uncertainties that come with operating in such a uniquely exposed environment. ^[34]

For risk-tolerant investors, HE stock in late 2025 looks like a turnaround-and-recovery story with index tailwinds, not a sleepy dividend utility. For more conservative investors, the stock may remain firmly in the “watch from a distance” category until the settlement is finalized, new wildfire-safety rules are stress-tested, and earnings normalize.