Assured Guaranty Ltd. (NYSE:AGO) Announces $0.31 Quarterly Dividend

Assured Guaranty Ltd. (NYSE:AGO) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, August 7th, Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Wednesday, August 21st will be paid a dividend of 0.31 per share by the financial services provider on Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $1.24 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.61%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, August 21st.

Assured Guaranty has raised its dividend payment by an average of 11.9% per year over the last three years. Assured Guaranty has a dividend payout ratio of 19.6% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Assured Guaranty to earn $7.20 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.24 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 17.2%.

Assured Guaranty Stock Performance

Shares of AGO opened at $76.87 on Tuesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.30, a current ratio of 0.97 and a quick ratio of 0.97. Assured Guaranty has a one year low of $56.77 and a one year high of $96.60. The firm has a market capitalization of $4.19 billion, a P/E ratio of 5.94 and a beta of 1.11. The business has a fifty day moving average of $78.14 and a 200 day moving average of $80.99.

Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, August 7th. The financial services provider reported $1.44 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.39 by $0.05. Assured Guaranty had a return on equity of 12.48% and a net margin of 57.45%. The company had revenue of $202.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $193.05 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.60 earnings per share. Assured Guaranty’s revenue was down 43.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Assured Guaranty will post 6.45 EPS for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts recently commented on the company. StockNews.com raised Assured Guaranty from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday. Roth Mkm reissued a “buy” rating and set a $110.00 price target on shares of Assured Guaranty in a report on Tuesday, July 9th. UBS Group cut their price target on Assured Guaranty from $102.00 to $84.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Friday, August 9th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised Assured Guaranty from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their price target for the company from $87.00 to $92.00 in a report on Tuesday, July 9th.

Insider Buying and Selling at Assured Guaranty

In other Assured Guaranty news, CEO Dominic Frederico sold 40,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $78.12, for a total transaction of $3,124,800.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 1,410,824 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $110,213,570.88. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 5.10% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Assured Guaranty Company Profile

Assured Guaranty Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides credit protection products to public finance, infrastructure, and structured finance markets in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments: Insurance and Asset Management. The company offers financial guaranty insurance that protects holders of debt instruments and other monetary obligations from defaults in scheduled payments.