Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) Announces Dividend Increase – $0.65 Per Share

Ecolab Inc. (NYSE:ECL) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, December 5th,RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, December 17th will be paid a dividend of 0.65 per share by the basic materials company on Wednesday, January 15th. This represents a $2.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.05%. This is a boost from Ecolab’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.57.

Ecolab has raised its dividend payment by an average of 4.6% annually over the last three years and has increased its dividend annually for the last 32 consecutive years. Ecolab has a payout ratio of 30.4% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Ecolab to earn $7.47 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 30.5%.

Ecolab Stock Down 0.4 %

ECL opened at $247.93 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $70.20 billion, a PE ratio of 34.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.48 and a beta of 1.13. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 1.30 and a quick ratio of 0.97. Ecolab has a fifty-two week low of $189.58 and a fifty-two week high of $262.61. The business has a 50-day moving average of $250.89 and a 200-day moving average of $245.23.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The basic materials company reported $1.83 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.82 by $0.01. Ecolab had a net margin of 13.05% and a return on equity of 22.12%. The firm had revenue of $4 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $4.03 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.54 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Equities research analysts forecast that Ecolab will post 6.65 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

ECL has been the topic of several analyst reports. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on shares of Ecolab from $240.00 to $263.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Piper Sandler raised their price objective on Ecolab from $270.00 to $305.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. Barclays upped their target price on Ecolab from $260.00 to $300.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, November 18th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued a “market perform” rating on shares of Ecolab in a research report on Friday, October 18th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets upped their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $260.00 to $279.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Ecolab presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $279.87.

Insider Activity at Ecolab

In other news, Director Victoria Reich sold 393 shares of Ecolab stock in a transaction dated Thursday, September 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $250.00, for a total transaction of $98,250.00. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 24,041 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,010,250. The trade was a 1.61 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, major shareholder William H. Gates III sold 70,000 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $245.95, for a total transaction of $17,216,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 29,178,741 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,176,511,348.95. This trade represents a 0.24 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 834,959 shares of company stock worth $205,323,667. Company insiders own 0.04% of the company’s stock.

About Ecolab

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.