Moody’s Co. to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.85 (NYSE:MCO)

Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO) announced a quarterly dividend on Friday, May 3rd, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be given a dividend of 0.85 per share by the business services provider on Friday, June 7th. This represents a $3.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.89%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, May 16th.

Moody’s has raised its dividend by an average of 11.2% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 14 consecutive years.

Moody’s Price Performance

Shares of Moody’s stock traded up $4.16 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $380.56. 784,857 shares of the company were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 736,418. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.01, a current ratio of 1.74 and a quick ratio of 1.74. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $384.07 and a 200-day simple moving average of $372.82. Moody’s has a 52 week low of $296.45 and a 52 week high of $407.62. The firm has a market cap of $69.45 billion, a P/E ratio of 43.59, a PEG ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.26.

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The business services provider reported $3.37 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.06 by $0.31. Moody’s had a net margin of 27.16% and a return on equity of 55.23%. The business had revenue of $1.79 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.70 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $2.99 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 21.5% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts forecast that Moody’s will post 10.77 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MCO has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. StockNews.com raised Moody’s from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 16th. Oppenheimer increased their target price on shares of Moody’s from $411.00 to $424.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 2nd. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $450.00 price target on shares of Moody’s in a report on Wednesday, February 14th. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price objective on Moody’s from $430.00 to $414.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, February 14th. Finally, Barclays raised Moody’s from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price target for the stock from $375.00 to $450.00 in a research report on Tuesday, April 2nd. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $398.50.

Moody’s Company Profile

Moody's Corporation operates as an integrated risk assessment firm worldwide. It operates in two segments, Moody's Analytics and Moody's Investors Services. The Moody's Analytics segment develops a range of products and services that support the risk management activities of institutional participants in financial markets.