Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) Posts Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.03 EPS

Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) released its earnings results on Friday. The financial services provider reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.88 by $0.03, Briefing.com reports. The company had revenue of $106.94 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $59.90 million. Lakeland Financial had a return on equity of 14.72% and a net margin of 23.70%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.98 earnings per share.

Lakeland Financial Stock Performance

NASDAQ:LKFN traded down $1.88 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $62.87. The company had a trading volume of 105,151 shares, compared to its average volume of 113,827. The firm has a market cap of $1.60 billion, a P/E ratio of 16.04 and a beta of 0.65. Lakeland Financial has a fifty-two week low of $47.63 and a fifty-two week high of $73.22. The business’s fifty day moving average is $65.26 and its two-hundred day moving average is $63.20.

Lakeland Financial Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, November 5th. Investors of record on Friday, October 25th will be paid a dividend of $0.48 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 25th. This represents a $1.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.05%. Lakeland Financial’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 48.98%.

Insider Activity at Lakeland Financial

In other news, CAO Brok A. Lahrman sold 415 shares of Lakeland Financial stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, July 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $68.91, for a total value of $28,597.65. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 1,739 shares in the company, valued at $119,834.49. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In related news, CAO Brok A. Lahrman sold 415 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $68.91, for a total transaction of $28,597.65. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 1,739 shares in the company, valued at approximately $119,834.49. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, SVP James Rickard Donovan sold 800 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, September 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $65.42, for a total value of $52,336.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 9,568 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $625,938.56. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 13,635 shares of company stock worth $914,604. 3.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Separately, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price objective on Lakeland Financial from $64.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Monday, July 29th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $71.00.

About Lakeland Financial

Lakeland Financial Corporation operates as the bank holding company for Lake City Bank that provides various banking products and services in the United States. The company accepts various deposit products, such as noninterest bearing, interest-bearing checking, savings, money market, NOW, and demand deposits.