HCA Healthcare (NYSE:HCA) Updates FY24 Earnings Guidance

HCA Healthcare (NYSE:HCA) issued an update on its FY24 earnings guidance on Friday morning. The company provided earnings per share guidance of $19.70-21.20 for the period, compared to the consensus earnings per share estimate of $20.60. The company issued revenue guidance of $67.75-70.25 billion, compared to the consensus revenue estimate of $69.06 billion. HCA Healthcare also updated its FY 2024 guidance to 19.700-21.200 EPS.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have commented on HCA. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on shares of HCA Healthcare from $303.00 to $315.00 and gave the company an equal weight rating in a research report on Thursday, March 28th. Cantor Fitzgerald restated an overweight rating and issued a $335.00 price target on shares of HCA Healthcare in a report on Wednesday, April 10th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of HCA Healthcare from a buy rating to a strong-buy rating in a report on Monday. Sanford C. Bernstein cut shares of HCA Healthcare from an outperform rating to a market perform rating and raised their price target for the company from $277.00 to $301.00 in a report on Thursday, January 4th. Finally, Truist Financial lifted their target price on shares of HCA Healthcare from $320.00 to $345.00 and gave the stock a buy rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 31st. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eleven have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and a consensus price target of $310.88.

HCA Healthcare Price Performance

Shares of NYSE HCA opened at $314.12 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $83.08 billion, a PE ratio of 16.55, a PEG ratio of 1.54 and a beta of 1.65. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $324.24 and a 200 day moving average of $294.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 35.07, a quick ratio of 1.02 and a current ratio of 1.18. HCA Healthcare has a one year low of $215.96 and a one year high of $335.83.

HCA Healthcare (NYSE:HCA) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 30th. The company reported $5.90 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $5.05 by $0.85. HCA Healthcare had a net margin of 8.07% and a return on equity of 996.30%. The company had revenue of $17.30 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $16.51 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $4.64 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 11.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that HCA Healthcare will post 20.58 EPS for the current fiscal year.

HCA Healthcare Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 29th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 15th were issued a dividend of $0.66 per share. This is a positive change from HCA Healthcare’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.60. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 14th. This represents a $2.64 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.84%. HCA Healthcare’s dividend payout ratio is presently 13.91%.

HCA Healthcare announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a share buyback plan on Tuesday, January 30th that permits the company to repurchase $6.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization permits the company to buy up to 7.4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are usually a sign that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity at HCA Healthcare

In related news, SVP Chad J. Wasserman sold 344 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $321.97, for a total value of $110,757.68. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 2,452 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $789,470.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other HCA Healthcare news, SVP Chad J. Wasserman sold 344 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, March 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $321.97, for a total transaction of $110,757.68. Following the completion of the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 2,452 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $789,470.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, SVP Sammie S. Mosier sold 1,645 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $312.00, for a total transaction of $513,240.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 7,646 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,385,552. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 14,840 shares of company stock valued at $4,588,869. 1.60% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About HCA Healthcare

HCA Healthcare, Inc, through its subsidiaries, owns and operates hospitals and related healthcare entities in the United States. It operates general and acute care hospitals that offers medical and surgical services, including inpatient care, intensive care, cardiac care, diagnostic, and emergency services; and outpatient services, such as outpatient surgery, laboratory, radiology, respiratory therapy, cardiology, and physical therapy.