Graco Inc. (GGG) to Distribute Quarterly Dividend of $0.28 on May 7th

Graco Inc. (NYSE:GGG) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, February 14th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Monday, April 14th will be given a dividend of 0.275 per share by the industrial products company on Wednesday, May 7th. This represents a $1.10 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.28%.

Graco has raised its dividend payment by an average of 10.4% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 28 consecutive years. Graco has a dividend payout ratio of 34.0% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Graco to earn $3.25 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.10 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 33.8%.

Graco Trading Down 0.3 %

Shares of NYSE GGG opened at $85.84 on Friday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $84.88 and its 200 day moving average price is $84.80. Graco has a 52 week low of $77.49 and a 52 week high of $94.77. The stock has a market cap of $14.49 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.44, a PEG ratio of 2.75 and a beta of 0.84.

Graco (NYSE:GGG) last released its quarterly earnings results on Monday, January 27th. The industrial products company reported $0.64 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.77 by ($0.13). Graco had a return on equity of 19.38% and a net margin of 23.00%. As a group, research analysts expect that Graco will post 3.07 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Graco news, EVP Kathryn L. Schoenrock sold 1,527 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, November 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $90.30, for a total value of $137,888.10. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 6,374 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $575,572.20. This represents a 19.33 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, insider Caroline M. Chambers sold 8,280 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, December 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $90.57, for a total transaction of $749,919.60. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 57,612 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,217,918.84. The trade was a 12.57 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 2.63% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several research firms recently commented on GGG. Robert W. Baird dropped their target price on Graco from $88.00 to $85.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Royal Bank of Canada boosted their target price on Graco from $93.00 to $97.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Finally, BNP Paribas raised shares of Graco from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $105.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Graco presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $91.50.

About Graco

Graco Inc designs, manufactures, and markets systems and equipment used to move, measure, control, dispense, and spray fluid and powder materials worldwide. The Contractor segment offers sprayers to apply paint to walls and other structures; two-component proportioning systems that are used to spray polyurethane foam and polyurea coatings; and viscous coatings to roofs, as well as markings on roads, parking lots, athletic fields, and floors.