Ball Co. (BALL) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.20 on March 17th

Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, January 29th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Monday, March 3rd will be given a dividend of 0.20 per share on Monday, March 17th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.42%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 3rd.

Ball has raised its dividend by an average of 4.6% annually over the last three years. Ball has a payout ratio of 20.5% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Ball to earn $3.55 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.80 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 22.5%.

Ball Price Performance

Shares of NYSE:BALL opened at $56.23 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.79, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 1.09. The company has a market capitalization of $16.78 billion, a PE ratio of 4.24, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.35 and a beta of 0.93. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $56.77 and a 200-day moving average of $61.33. Ball has a one year low of $51.96 and a one year high of $71.32.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 31st. The company reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.87 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $3.08 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.13 billion. Ball had a net margin of 34.05% and a return on equity of 17.46%. The firm’s revenue was down .9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.83 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Ball will post 3.15 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

BALL has been the subject of several research reports. Citigroup reduced their price target on Ball from $69.00 to $59.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 6th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued an “underweight” rating and issued a $49.00 target price (down from $56.00) on shares of Ball in a research report on Thursday, January 16th. UBS Group upgraded Ball from a “sell” rating to a “neutral” rating and decreased their target price for the company from $62.00 to $58.00 in a research note on Friday, January 10th. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $75.00 target price on shares of Ball in a report on Monday, November 4th. Finally, Morgan Stanley cut their price target on Ball from $78.00 to $75.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 13th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating, seven have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $68.17.

Ball announced that its board has initiated a share repurchase program on Wednesday, January 29th that authorizes the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the company to repurchase up to 24.2% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

About Ball

Ball Corporation supplies aluminum packaging products for the beverage, personal care, and household products industries in the United States, Brazil, and internationally. The company manufactures and sells aluminum beverage containers to fillers of carbonated soft drinks, beer, energy drinks, and other beverages.