National Bank of Canada (TSE:NA) Rating Lowered to Hold at Barclays

Barclays downgraded shares of National Bank of Canada (TSE:NA) from a strong-buy rating to a hold rating in a research note released on Thursday,Zacks.com reports.

Several other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on NA. Jefferies Financial Group boosted their target price on shares of National Bank of Canada from C$119.00 to C$126.00 in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. BMO Capital Markets upped their price objective on shares of National Bank of Canada from C$125.00 to C$143.00 in a research report on Monday, November 18th. Desjardins raised their target price on National Bank of Canada from C$116.00 to C$118.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 6th. Canaccord Genuity Group upped their price target on National Bank of Canada from C$123.00 to C$135.00 in a report on Tuesday. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on National Bank of Canada from C$113.00 to C$116.00 in a report on Thursday, August 29th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have assigned a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of C$126.36.

National Bank of Canada Stock Performance

TSE NA opened at C$137.81 on Thursday. The firm has a market capitalization of C$46.91 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.42, a PEG ratio of 7.14 and a beta of 1.12. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of C$130.71 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of C$120.15. National Bank of Canada has a fifty-two week low of C$87.92 and a fifty-two week high of C$138.10.

National Bank of Canada (TSE:NA) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, August 28th. The financial services provider reported C$2.68 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of C$2.50 by C$0.18. National Bank of Canada had a return on equity of 15.18% and a net margin of 34.50%. The company had revenue of C$2.98 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of C$2.95 billion. As a group, analysts forecast that National Bank of Canada will post 10.8360791 earnings per share for the current year.

National Bank of Canada Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 1st. Stockholders of record on Monday, September 30th were given a $1.10 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 27th. This represents a $4.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.19%. National Bank of Canada’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 42.84%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Yvon Charest bought 285 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 19th. The shares were bought at an average cost of C$133.71 per share, for a total transaction of C$38,107.35. 0.21% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

About National Bank of Canada

National Bank of Canada provides financial services to individuals, businesses, institutional clients, and governments in Canada and internationally. It operates through four segments: Personal and Commercial, Wealth Management, Financial Markets, and U.S. Specialty Finance and International. The Personal and Commercial segment offers personal banking services, including transaction solutions, mortgage loans and home equity lines of credit, consumer loans, payment solutions, and savings and investment solutions; various insurance products; and commercial banking services, such as credit, and deposit, investment solutions, international trade, foreign exchange transactions, payroll, cash management, insurance, electronic transactions, and complimentary services.