Heartland Express, Inc. to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.02 (NASDAQ:HTLD)

Heartland Express, Inc. (NASDAQ:HTLD) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, August 6th, Zacks reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 27th will be given a dividend of 0.02 per share by the transportation company on Monday, October 7th. This represents a $0.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.67%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, September 27th.

Heartland Express has a dividend payout ratio of 22.2% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Heartland Express to earn $0.48 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.08 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 16.7%.

Heartland Express Price Performance

Shares of HTLD stock opened at $11.95 on Thursday. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $12.30 and its 200 day simple moving average is $11.74. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 1.23 and a quick ratio of 1.23. Heartland Express has a one year low of $9.63 and a one year high of $15.56. The firm has a market cap of $944.66 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -70.29 and a beta of 0.69.

Heartland Express (NASDAQ:HTLD) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The transportation company reported ($0.04) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.06) by $0.02. The company had revenue of $274.80 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $275.23 million. Heartland Express had a negative net margin of 2.17% and a negative return on equity of 2.84%. Heartland Express’s quarterly revenue was down 10.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.10 earnings per share. On average, analysts expect that Heartland Express will post -0.17 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Heartland Express

In other Heartland Express news, CEO Michael J. Gerdin purchased 50,000 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, September 11th. The shares were acquired at an average cost of $11.67 per share, with a total value of $583,500.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 1,196,718 shares in the company, valued at $13,965,699.06. The purchase was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Insiders own 39.60% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on HTLD shares. StockNews.com raised shares of Heartland Express from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. UBS Group lowered Heartland Express from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their target price for the company from $15.00 to $13.00 in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. restated an “underweight” rating and set a $10.00 price objective (down from $12.00) on shares of Heartland Express in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Heartland Express from $10.00 to $11.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a report on Thursday, August 1st. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and three have issued a hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Heartland Express presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $12.00.

About Heartland Express

Heartland Express, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates as a short-to-medium, and long-haul truckload carrier in the United States and Canada. It primarily provides nationwide asset-based dry van truckload service for shippers; cross-border freight and other transportation services; and temperature-controlled truckload services.