Garmin Ltd. (GRMN) To Go Ex-Dividend on March 13th

Garmin Ltd. (NYSE:GRMN) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, February 20th, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 13th will be paid a dividend of 0.90 per share by the scientific and technical instruments company on Friday, March 27th. This represents a $3.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.60%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 13th. This is a boost from Garmin’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.75.

Garmin has raised its dividend by an average of 4.4% per year over the last three years. Garmin has a payout ratio of 37.2% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Garmin to earn $7.98 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 37.6%.

Garmin Trading Down 1.9 %

GRMN stock opened at $224.67 on Friday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $213.24 and its 200 day moving average price is $195.07. Garmin has a 52 week low of $131.20 and a 52 week high of $246.50. The company has a market cap of $43.23 billion, a P/E ratio of 30.73, a P/E/G ratio of 1.36 and a beta of 0.98.

Garmin (NYSE:GRMN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 19th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $2.41 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.90 by $0.51. The business had revenue of $1.82 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.70 billion. Garmin had a return on equity of 19.31% and a net margin of 22.42%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 22.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $1.72 EPS. On average, equities research analysts expect that Garmin will post 7.8 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Garmin

In other news, CFO Douglas G. Boessen sold 1,761 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $207.99, for a total transaction of $366,270.39. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 27,612 shares in the company, valued at $5,743,019.88. This trade represents a 6.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Insiders own 19.54% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on GRMN. Barclays raised their price target on Garmin from $158.00 to $188.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Thursday. Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of Garmin to a “sell” rating and raised their target price for the company from $164.00 to $171.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 11th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on shares of Garmin from $219.00 to $260.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday. Finally, Tigress Financial increased their price target on shares of Garmin from $215.00 to $265.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $195.67.

About Garmin

Garmin Ltd. designs, develops, manufactures, markets, and distributes a range of wireless devices worldwide. Its Fitness segment offers running and multi-sport watches; cycling products; smartwatch devices; scales and monitors; and fitness accessories. This segment also provides Garmin Connect and Garmin Connect Mobile, which are web and mobile platforms where users can track and analyze their fitness, activities and workouts, and wellness data; and Connect IQ, an application development platform.