Woodward, Inc. (NASDAQ:WWD) Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.25

Woodward, Inc. (NASDAQ:WWD) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, June 27th, Zacks reports. Shareholders of record on Thursday, August 22nd will be given a dividend of 0.25 per share by the technology company on Thursday, September 5th. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.57%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 22nd.

Woodward has increased its dividend payment by an average of 18.9% per year over the last three years. Woodward has a payout ratio of 15.9% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Woodward to earn $6.25 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 16.0%.

Woodward Trading Down 1.6 %

NASDAQ WWD opened at $174.38 on Friday. The company has a market cap of $10.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.83 and a beta of 1.37. Woodward has a twelve month low of $115.90 and a twelve month high of $188.35. The company has a quick ratio of 1.78, a current ratio of 2.62 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.28. The business’s fifty day moving average is $176.39 and its 200 day moving average is $153.81.

Woodward (NASDAQ:WWD) last posted its earnings results on Monday, April 29th. The technology company reported $1.62 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.28 by $0.34. Woodward had a return on equity of 16.50% and a net margin of 11.09%. The firm had revenue of $835.34 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $807.04 million. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.01 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 16.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Woodward will post 5.88 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently weighed in on WWD. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Woodward from $156.00 to $172.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 30th. Truist Financial boosted their target price on shares of Woodward from $143.00 to $152.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 30th. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price target on Woodward from $159.00 to $201.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, April 16th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their target price on Woodward from $200.00 to $210.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 28th. Finally, Barclays boosted their price target on Woodward from $140.00 to $175.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Monday, May 6th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Woodward presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $174.38.

Insider Activity

In other Woodward news, Director Gregg C. Sengstack sold 6,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $167.01, for a total value of $1,002,060.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 17,450 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,914,324.50. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. 1.12% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Woodward

Woodward, Inc designs, manufactures, and services control solutions for the aerospace and industrial markets worldwide. The company operates in two segments, Aerospace and Industrial. The Aerospace segment provides fuel pumps, metering units, actuators, air valves, specialty valves, fuel nozzles, and thrust reverser actuation systems for turbine engines and nacelles, and flight deck controls, actuators, servocontrols, motors, and sensors for aircraft.