The Home Depot, Inc. (NYSE:HD) to Issue $2.25 Quarterly Dividend

The Home Depot, Inc. (NYSE:HD) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, August 15th, RTT News reports. Investors of record on Thursday, August 29th will be paid a dividend of 2.25 per share by the home improvement retailer on Thursday, September 12th. This represents a $9.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.50%.

Home Depot has raised its dividend by an average of 11.7% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 15 consecutive years. Home Depot has a dividend payout ratio of 55.9% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Home Depot to earn $16.15 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $9.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 55.7%.

Home Depot Trading Up 1.2 %

NYSE HD traded up $4.41 during trading hours on Thursday, reaching $360.07. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 3,573,145 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,434,914. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $349.46 and a 200-day simple moving average of $353.16. The stock has a market cap of $357.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 24.14, a P/E/G ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 0.98. Home Depot has a 52 week low of $274.26 and a 52 week high of $396.87. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 23.11, a current ratio of 1.34 and a quick ratio of 0.42.

Home Depot (NYSE:HD) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, August 13th. The home improvement retailer reported $4.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $4.59 by $0.08. The firm had revenue of $43.18 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $42.57 billion. Home Depot had a net margin of 9.79% and a return on equity of 1,056.67%. The company’s revenue was up .6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the business earned $4.65 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Home Depot will post 15.28 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms recently issued reports on HD. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Home Depot from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, May 25th. Raymond James reissued a “market perform” rating on shares of Home Depot in a research report on Wednesday, May 15th. Evercore ISI reduced their price target on shares of Home Depot from $415.00 to $400.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. HSBC reduced their price target on shares of Home Depot from $323.00 to $318.00 and set a “reduce” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, May 15th. Finally, Telsey Advisory Group restated a “market perform” rating and set a $360.00 price objective on shares of Home Depot in a research note on Tuesday. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and nineteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Home Depot has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $384.00.

About Home Depot

The Home Depot, Inc operates as a home improvement retailer in the United States and internationally. It sells various building materials, home improvement products, lawn and garden products, and décor products, as well as facilities maintenance, repair, and operations products. The company also offers installation services for flooring, water heaters, bath, garage doors, cabinets, cabinet makeovers, countertops, sheds, furnaces and central air systems, and windows.