Lincoln Electric Holdings, Inc. to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.75 (NASDAQ:LECO)

Lincoln Electric Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:LECO) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, February 20th, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 31st will be paid a dividend of 0.75 per share by the industrial products company on Tuesday, April 15th. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.45%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 31st.

Lincoln Electric has raised its dividend payment by an average of 11.3% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 30 years. Lincoln Electric has a dividend payout ratio of 29.4% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Lincoln Electric to earn $10.08 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 29.8%.

Lincoln Electric Trading Down 2.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ:LECO opened at $207.27 on Friday. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $194.99 and a 200-day moving average price of $196.30. The company has a quick ratio of 1.25, a current ratio of 1.87 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.87. The stock has a market cap of $11.70 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.43, a PEG ratio of 1.51 and a beta of 1.18. Lincoln Electric has a 52-week low of $169.51 and a 52-week high of $261.13.

Lincoln Electric (NASDAQ:LECO) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The industrial products company reported $2.57 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.03 by $0.54. The company had revenue of $1.02 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $995.94 million. Lincoln Electric had a return on equity of 40.19% and a net margin of 11.63%. Equities analysts predict that Lincoln Electric will post 9.36 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Lincoln Electric

In other news, CEO Steven B. Hedlund sold 21,054 shares of Lincoln Electric stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $215.47, for a total value of $4,536,505.38. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 54,660 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,777,590.20. The trade was a 27.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Corporate insiders own 2.63% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts recently weighed in on LECO shares. Barclays lifted their price target on Lincoln Electric from $220.00 to $235.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday. StockNews.com upgraded Lincoln Electric from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, December 4th. KeyCorp lifted their price target on Lincoln Electric from $230.00 to $245.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, February 14th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus dropped their price objective on Lincoln Electric from $216.00 to $211.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 24th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $233.60.

About Lincoln Electric

Lincoln Electric Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, designs, develops, manufactures, and sells welding, cutting, and brazing products worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Americas Welding, International Welding, and The Harris Products Group. It offers brazing and soldering filler metals, arc welding equipment, plasma and oxyfuel cutting systems, wire feeding systems, fume control equipment, welding accessories, and specialty gas regulators, and education solutions, as well as a portfolio of automated solutions for joining, cutting, material handling, module assembly, and end of line testing, as well as involved in brazing and soldering alloys, and in the retail business in the United States.