Imperial Oil (TSE:IMO) Hits New 12-Month High – Should You Buy?

Imperial Oil Limited (TSE:IMO) (NYSEMKT:IMO) reached a new 52-week high during mid-day trading on Monday . The stock traded as high as C$184.27 and last traded at C$183.09, with a volume of 61585 shares traded. The stock had previously closed at C$181.25.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on the company. National Bank Financial increased their target price on Imperial Oil from C$127.00 to C$139.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 3rd. UBS Group upped their price objective on Imperial Oil from C$155.00 to C$185.00 in a report on Monday, March 16th. BMO Capital Markets lowered Imperial Oil from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their price objective for the stock from C$132.00 to C$129.00 in a report on Monday, December 15th. Raymond James Financial increased their price objective on Imperial Oil from C$106.00 to C$107.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on Imperial Oil from C$99.00 to C$108.00 in a report on Tuesday, February 3rd. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a Hold rating and five have assigned a Sell rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Strong Sell” and a consensus target price of C$122.45.

Imperial Oil Stock Performance

The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is C$158.32 and its 200-day simple moving average is C$138.19. The company has a quick ratio of 0.98, a current ratio of 1.27 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 19.69. The company has a market capitalization of C$88.90 billion, a PE ratio of 28.37, a PEG ratio of 0.21 and a beta of 0.90.

Imperial Oil (TSE:IMO) (NYSEMKT:IMO) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, January 30th. The company reported C$1.97 EPS for the quarter. The business had revenue of C$11.28 billion for the quarter. Imperial Oil had a return on equity of 14.75% and a net margin of 7.02%. On average, research analysts predict that Imperial Oil Limited will post 8.6164609 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Imperial Oil Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 1st. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, April 1st will be given a dividend of $0.87 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, March 5th. This is a positive change from Imperial Oil’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.72. This represents a $3.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.9%. Imperial Oil’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 44.44%.

About Imperial Oil

Imperial Oil is one of Canada’s largest integrated oil companies, focusing on upstream operations, petroleum refining operations, and the marketing of petroleum products. Production averaged 398 thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day in 2020. The company estimates that it holds 5.2 billion boe of proved and probable crude oil and natural gas reserves. Imperial remains the largest refiner of petroleum products in Canada, operating three refineries with a combined processing capacity of 421 mboe/d.