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

Ball Co. (NYSE:BALL) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, April 24th, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Monday, June 3rd will be paid a dividend of 0.20 per share on Monday, June 17th. This represents a $0.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.22%.

Ball has increased its dividend by an average of 10.1% per year over the last three years. Ball has a dividend payout ratio of 23.4% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Ball to earn $3.48 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 23.0%.

Ball Stock Up 0.4 %

Shares of NYSE:BALL opened at $65.45 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $20.66 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.22, a PEG ratio of 4.23 and a beta of 0.89. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $64.97 and its 200-day simple moving average is $57.78. The company has a quick ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.96. Ball has a fifty-two week low of $42.81 and a fifty-two week high of $67.97.

Ball (NYSE:BALL) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 1st. The company reported $0.78 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.77 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $3.40 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $3.56 billion. Ball had a net margin of 5.04% and a return on equity of 23.81%. The firm’s revenue was down 4.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.44 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Ball will post 3.09 earnings per share for the current year.

Ball announced that its Board of Directors has initiated a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, April 24th that allows the company to repurchase 40,000,000 outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization allows the company to buy shares of its stock through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are typically a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several analysts have issued reports on the stock. Mizuho upped their price target on shares of Ball to $63.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Ball from $52.00 to $62.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday, March 18th. Truist Financial reissued a “hold” rating and issued a $60.00 price objective on shares of Ball in a research report on Friday, April 12th. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their price objective on shares of Ball from $69.00 to $78.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, UBS Group initiated coverage on shares of Ball in a research report on Tuesday, January 16th. They issued a “sell” rating and a $55.00 price objective for the company. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Ball has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $65.58.

Insider Activity

In related news, insider Daniel William Fisher acquired 3,869 shares of Ball stock in a transaction on Thursday, March 14th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $64.56 per share, for a total transaction of $249,782.64. Following the purchase, the insider now directly owns 111,866 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,222,068.96. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Insiders own 0.81% of the company’s stock.

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.