AudioCodes Ltd. (AUDC) to Issue Semi-annual Dividend of $0.18 on March 6th

AudioCodes Ltd. (NASDAQ:AUDC) declared a semi-annual dividend on Thursday, February 6th,Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Thursday, February 20th will be paid a dividend of 0.18 per share by the communications equipment provider on Thursday, March 6th. This represents a dividend yield of 3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, February 20th.

AudioCodes has increased its dividend payment by an average of 2.9% annually over the last three years. AudioCodes has a dividend payout ratio of 32.1% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect AudioCodes to earn $0.70 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.36 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 51.4%.

AudioCodes Stock Performance

Shares of AUDC stock opened at $12.22 on Friday. AudioCodes has a 52 week low of $7.70 and a 52 week high of $14.04. The company has a market capitalization of $369.29 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.55 and a beta of 0.80. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $9.97 and a 200 day simple moving average of $9.82.

AudioCodes (NASDAQ:AUDC) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 4th. The communications equipment provider reported $0.31 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.22 by $0.09. AudioCodes had a return on equity of 8.85% and a net margin of 4.99%. Sell-side analysts forecast that AudioCodes will post 0.51 EPS for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have weighed in on AUDC. Barclays increased their price objective on AudioCodes from $9.00 to $10.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday. StockNews.com raised shares of AudioCodes from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday. Finally, Needham & Company LLC boosted their price objective on shares of AudioCodes from $11.00 to $12.50 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday.

About AudioCodes

AudioCodes Ltd. provides advanced communications software, products, and productivity solutions for the digital workplace worldwide. The company offers solutions, products, and services for unified communications, contact centers, hosted business services, Voice.AI, and service provider businesses. Its products include session border controllers, life cycle management solutions, VoIP network routing solutions, media gateways and servers, multi-service business routers, IP phones solutions, and value-added applications, as well as professional services.