Albemarle Co. Declares Quarterly Dividend of $0.40 (NYSE:ALB)

Albemarle Co. (NYSE:ALB) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, May 7th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 14th will be paid a dividend of 0.40 per share by the specialty chemicals company on Monday, July 1st. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.23%.

Albemarle has increased its dividend payment by an average of 1.3% annually over the last three years and has increased its dividend annually for the last 29 consecutive years. Albemarle has a payout ratio of 19.4% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Albemarle to earn $6.95 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.60 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 23.0%.

Albemarle Stock Down 1.2 %

Shares of NYSE:ALB traded down $1.58 during midday trading on Wednesday, reaching $129.97. The company had a trading volume of 414,135 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,176,623. The stock has a market capitalization of $15.28 billion, a P/E ratio of 47.86, a PEG ratio of 2.80 and a beta of 1.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.37, a current ratio of 2.84 and a quick ratio of 1.91. Albemarle has a one year low of $106.69 and a one year high of $247.44. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $123.51 and its 200-day moving average price is $125.90.

Albemarle (NYSE:ALB) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The specialty chemicals company reported $0.26 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.35 by ($0.09). Albemarle had a return on equity of 14.53% and a net margin of 4.02%. The firm had revenue of $1.36 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.29 billion. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $10.32 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 47.3% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts expect that Albemarle will post 2.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts recently commented on ALB shares. Bank of America upgraded Albemarle from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $137.00 to $156.00 in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Scotiabank reduced their target price on shares of Albemarle from $160.00 to $150.00 and set a “sector outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday. TD Cowen lowered shares of Albemarle from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their price target for the company from $220.00 to $130.00 in a research note on Monday, January 29th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on Albemarle from $135.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, April 11th. Finally, Loop Capital lowered their target price on shares of Albemarle from $168.00 to $162.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, March 15th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating and eleven have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Albemarle presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $172.05.

Albemarle Company Profile

Albemarle Corporation develops, manufactures, and markets engineered specialty chemicals worldwide. It operates through three segments: Energy Storage, Specialties and Ketjen. The Energy Storage segment offers lithium compounds, including lithium carbonate, lithium hydroxide, and lithium chloride; technical services for the handling and use of reactive lithium products; and lithium-containing by-products recycling services.