American Electric Power Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:AEP) to Issue $0.88 Quarterly Dividend

American Electric Power Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:AEP) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, April 23rd, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 10th will be given a dividend of 0.88 per share on Monday, June 10th. This represents a $3.52 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.11%.

American Electric Power has increased its dividend by an average of 5.9% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 14 consecutive years. American Electric Power has a dividend payout ratio of 59.0% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect American Electric Power to earn $5.92 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.52 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 59.5%.

American Electric Power Trading Up 0.8 %

Shares of NASDAQ:AEP opened at $85.56 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $45.06 billion, a PE ratio of 20.13, a P/E/G ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.51. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $83.19 and its 200 day moving average price is $80.25. American Electric Power has a fifty-two week low of $69.38 and a fifty-two week high of $94.73. The company has a quick ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.53 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.49.

American Electric Power (NASDAQ:AEP) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 27th. The company reported $1.23 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.26 by ($0.03). American Electric Power had a net margin of 11.64% and a return on equity of 11.04%. The firm had revenue of $4.60 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.12 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.05 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts anticipate that American Electric Power will post 5.54 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of analysts recently commented on the stock. UBS Group downgraded shares of American Electric Power from a “neutral” rating to a “sell” rating and dropped their target price for the stock from $86.00 to $83.00 in a report on Monday, March 11th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of American Electric Power from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday, March 15th. LADENBURG THALM/SH SH downgraded shares of American Electric Power from a “neutral” rating to a “sell” rating and lowered their price objective for the company from $75.50 to $73.00 in a research report on Friday, March 8th. Scotiabank lowered their price objective on shares of American Electric Power from $92.00 to $86.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday. Finally, Guggenheim downgraded shares of American Electric Power from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $81.00 price objective on the stock. in a research report on Monday, January 22nd. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have assigned a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, American Electric Power has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $86.08.

American Electric Power Company Profile

American Electric Power Company, Inc, an electric public utility holding company, engages in the generation, transmission, and distribution of electricity for sale to retail and wholesale customers in the United States. It operates through Vertically Integrated Utilities, Transmission and Distribution Utilities, AEP Transmission Holdco, and Generation & Marketing segments.