Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) Announces $0.24 Quarterly Dividend

Bank of America Co. (NYSE:BAC) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, April 25th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 7th will be paid a dividend of 0.24 per share by the financial services provider on Friday, June 28th. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.53%.

Bank of America has raised its dividend payment by an average of 8.5% per year over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 3 years. Bank of America has a payout ratio of 27.5% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Bank of America to earn $3.44 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.96 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 27.9%.

Bank of America Trading Down 1.1 %

BAC opened at $37.91 on Friday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.79, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.12. The firm has a market cap of $299.13 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.12, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.72 and a beta of 1.39. The business’s 50 day moving average is $36.06 and its two-hundred day moving average is $32.64. Bank of America has a 52 week low of $24.96 and a 52 week high of $38.49.

Bank of America (NYSE:BAC) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, April 16th. The financial services provider reported $0.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.77 by $0.06. The company had revenue of $25.82 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $25.49 billion. Bank of America had a return on equity of 10.88% and a net margin of 13.94%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.94 EPS. On average, research analysts predict that Bank of America will post 3.19 EPS for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

BAC has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Oppenheimer reduced their price target on Bank of America from $46.00 to $45.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 17th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price objective on Bank of America from $36.00 to $37.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 18th. Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price objective on Bank of America from $36.00 to $39.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, April 8th. Erste Group Bank upgraded Bank of America from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, April 3rd. Finally, Morgan Stanley upgraded Bank of America from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price target for the stock from $32.00 to $41.00 in a research report on Tuesday, January 30th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $38.53.

About Bank of America

Bank of America Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides banking and financial products and services for individual consumers, small and middle-market businesses, institutional investors, large corporations, and governments worldwide. It operates in four segments: Consumer Banking, Global Wealth & Investment Management (GWIM), Global Banking, and Global Markets.