W. P. Carey (NYSE:WPC) Now Covered by Analysts at Barclays

Barclays started coverage on shares of W. P. Carey (NYSE:WPC) in a research note published on Wednesday, Marketbeat reports. The brokerage issued an equal weight rating and a $40.00 price target on the real estate investment trust’s stock.

WPC has been the subject of several other reports. Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price objective on W. P. Carey from $68.00 to $65.00 and set an outperform rating for the company in a report on Monday, February 12th. Scotiabank decreased their price objective on shares of W. P. Carey from $62.00 to $60.00 and set a sector perform rating for the company in a report on Monday, March 4th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their target price on shares of W. P. Carey from $66.00 to $61.00 and set an equal weight rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. StockNews.com assumed coverage on shares of W. P. Carey in a research note on Thursday, January 4th. They set a hold rating for the company. Finally, Raymond James downgraded W. P. Carey from an outperform rating to a market perform rating in a research note on Monday, February 12th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, W. P. Carey has an average rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $63.36.

W. P. Carey Stock Up 0.7 %

Shares of W. P. Carey stock opened at $55.98 on Wednesday. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $58.49 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $59.17. W. P. Carey has a 52-week low of $51.36 and a 52-week high of $78.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.89, a quick ratio of 0.62 and a current ratio of 0.62. The stock has a market capitalization of $12.24 billion, a PE ratio of 16.96, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.44 and a beta of 0.86.

W. P. Carey (NYSE:WPC) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Friday, February 9th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.66 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.52 by $0.14. W. P. Carey had a net margin of 40.68% and a return on equity of 7.78%. The company had revenue of $410.38 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $413.04 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.29 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.0% on a year-over-year basis. On average, analysts anticipate that W. P. Carey will post 4.57 EPS for the current fiscal year.

W. P. Carey Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, April 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, March 28th will be paid a $0.865 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, March 27th. This represents a $3.46 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 6.18%. This is an increase from W. P. Carey’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.86. W. P. Carey’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 104.24%.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in WPC. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in shares of W. P. Carey by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 30,784,040 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $1,995,114,000 after purchasing an additional 657,188 shares during the period. BlackRock Inc. increased its stake in W. P. Carey by 1.6% in the 2nd quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 15,618,194 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $1,055,165,000 after buying an additional 244,527 shares in the last quarter. Cohen & Steers Inc. lifted its position in shares of W. P. Carey by 91.9% in the fourth quarter. Cohen & Steers Inc. now owns 11,290,841 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock valued at $731,800,000 after acquiring an additional 5,407,289 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its stake in shares of W. P. Carey by 2.1% in the first quarter. State Street Corp now owns 10,228,412 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $802,831,000 after acquiring an additional 208,561 shares during the period. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. grew its position in shares of W. P. Carey by 46.1% during the first quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 6,558,610 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $507,966,000 after purchasing an additional 2,068,458 shares in the last quarter. 73.73% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About W. P. Carey

W. P. Carey ranks among the largest net lease REITs with a well-diversified portfolio of high-quality, operationally critical commercial real estate, which includes 1,424 net lease properties covering approximately 173 million square feet and a portfolio of 89 self-storage operating properties as of December 31, 2023.