Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) Announces Quarterly Earnings Results, Misses Estimates By $0.02 EPS

Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday. The airline reported ($0.36) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.34) by ($0.02), RTT News reports. Southwest Airlines had a net margin of 1.91% and a return on equity of 9.40%. The company had revenue of $6.33 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $6.42 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted ($0.27) EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 11.0% compared to the same quarter last year.

Southwest Airlines Price Performance

LUV traded down $2.48 during midday trading on Thursday, hitting $26.82. 11,313,675 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 8,348,401. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $30.62 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $28.54. The company has a market capitalization of $16.05 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.15, a PEG ratio of 1.04 and a beta of 1.15. The company has a current ratio of 1.14, a quick ratio of 1.07 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.76. Southwest Airlines has a 52-week low of $21.91 and a 52-week high of $39.53.

Southwest Airlines Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 27th. Investors of record on Wednesday, March 6th were issued a dividend of $0.18 per share. This represents a $0.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.68%. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, March 5th. Southwest Airlines’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 96.00%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

LUV has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Susquehanna lowered their target price on shares of Southwest Airlines from $30.00 to $27.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, April 9th. Morgan Stanley cut their price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines from $40.00 to $38.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, April 5th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised shares of Southwest Airlines from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $28.00 to $42.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. TD Cowen upped their price objective on Southwest Airlines from $20.00 to $26.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 26th. Finally, Argus raised shares of Southwest Airlines from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $40.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Tuesday, March 12th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $31.82.

Southwest Airlines Company Profile

Southwest Airlines Co operates as a passenger airline company that provides scheduled air transportation services in the United States and near-international markets. As of December 31, 2023, the company operated a total fleet of 817 Boeing 737 aircraft; and served 121 destinations in 42 states, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, as well as ten near-international countries, including Mexico, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Aruba, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Belize, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and Turks and Caicos.