BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE) Announces Quarterly Dividend of $1.00

BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, March 14th, TickerTech Dividends reports. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, April 15th will be given a dividend of 0.9975 per share on Tuesday, April 15th. This represents a $3.99 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 11.34%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 14th.

BCE Stock Performance

Shares of TSE:BCE traded down C$0.59 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, reaching C$35.19. 1,185,730 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 3,826,941. The company’s 50 day moving average price is C$33.88 and its 200-day moving average price is C$39.18. The firm has a market cap of C$31.87 billion, a PE ratio of 118.06, a PEG ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.48. BCE has a 52 week low of C$31.43 and a 52 week high of C$49.13. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 226.73, a current ratio of 0.62 and a quick ratio of 0.43.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities analysts have weighed in on BCE shares. Scotiabank dropped their price target on shares of BCE from C$42.00 to C$40.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, February 7th. National Bankshares increased their price target on BCE from C$35.00 to C$36.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut BCE from a “neutral” rating to an “underweight” rating and decreased their price target for the company from C$35.00 to C$29.00 in a report on Friday, February 7th. Royal Bank of Canada dropped their price objective on BCE from C$45.00 to C$41.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Finally, Barclays downgraded BCE from an “equal weight” rating to an “underperform” rating and decreased their target price for the company from C$41.00 to C$30.00 in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have issued a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of C$40.50.

About BCE

BCE is both a wireless and internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada. It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its roughly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrierthe legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provincesOntario and Quebec.