HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) Plans Quarterly Dividend of $0.29

HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, November 26th,Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Wednesday, December 11th will be paid a dividend of 0.2894 per share by the computer maker on Thursday, January 2nd. This represents a $1.16 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 3.34%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, December 11th. This is an increase from HP’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.28.

HP has raised its dividend by an average of 13.7% per year over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 14 years. HP has a dividend payout ratio of 30.5% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect HP to earn $3.59 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.10 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 30.6%.

HP Trading Down 11.4 %

Shares of NYSE HPQ opened at $34.66 on Thursday. HP has a one year low of $27.42 and a one year high of $39.79. The firm has a market capitalization of $33.40 billion, a PE ratio of 12.16, a PEG ratio of 2.70 and a beta of 1.07. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $36.56 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $35.52.

HP (NYSE:HPQ) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, November 26th. The computer maker reported $0.93 EPS for the quarter, hitting analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.93. HP had a negative return on equity of 266.37% and a net margin of 5.33%. The firm had revenue of $14.06 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.99 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.90 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 1.7% compared to the same quarter last year. Research analysts anticipate that HP will post 3.39 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at HP

In other news, CEO Enrique Lores sold 211,501 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $33.16, for a total transaction of $7,013,373.16. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 3 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $99.48. This represents a 100.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Company insiders own 0.41% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have commented on HPQ shares. Citigroup decreased their price objective on HP from $37.00 to $36.50 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price target on HP from $42.00 to $41.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, November 20th. UBS Group lifted their price target on HP from $34.00 to $37.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Bank of America lowered HP from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $37.00 price target for the company. in a report on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on HP from $37.00 to $36.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $36.32.

HP announced that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback program on Wednesday, August 28th that allows the company to buyback $10.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the computer maker to purchase up to 28.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are often a sign that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

About HP

HP Inc provides products, technologies, software, solutions, and services to individual consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses, and large enterprises, including customers in the government, health, and education sectors worldwide. It operates through Personal Systems and Printing segments. The Personal Systems segment offers commercial personal computers (PCs), consumer PCs, workstations, thin clients, commercial tablets and mobility devices, retail point-of-sale systems, displays and other related accessories, software, support, and services for the commercial and consumer markets.