Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) Declares Quarterly Dividend of $0.57

Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, May 2nd, RTT News reports. Investors of record on Tuesday, June 18th will be given a dividend of 0.57 per share by the basic materials company on Monday, July 15th. This represents a $2.28 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.01%.

Ecolab has increased its dividend payment by an average of 4.6% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 32 years. Ecolab has a dividend payout ratio of 31.3% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Ecolab to earn $7.27 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.28 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 31.4%.

Ecolab Stock Up 0.2 %

ECL stock traded up $0.49 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $225.47. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 283,526 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,204,106. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.92, a current ratio of 1.41 and a quick ratio of 0.95. Ecolab has a twelve month low of $156.72 and a twelve month high of $231.86. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $224.37 and its 200 day moving average price is $202.37. The stock has a market capitalization of $64.46 billion, a P/E ratio of 41.66, a PEG ratio of 2.61 and a beta of 1.08.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 30th. The basic materials company reported $1.34 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.33 by $0.01. Ecolab had a net margin of 10.01% and a return on equity of 20.56%. The firm had revenue of $3.75 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.74 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.88 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 5.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Ecolab will post 6.49 EPS for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have issued reports on ECL shares. Piper Sandler started coverage on shares of Ecolab in a research note on Wednesday, April 3rd. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $260.00 price target on the stock. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $238.00 to $260.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $230.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 27th. Finally, Bank of America upgraded shares of Ecolab from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $185.00 to $216.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 16th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Ecolab has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $233.65.

Ecolab Company Profile

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.