Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (JEF) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.40 on February 27th

Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, January 8th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Friday, February 14th will be given a dividend of 0.40 per share by the financial services provider on Thursday, February 27th. This represents a $1.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.00%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 14th. This is a positive change from Jefferies Financial Group’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.35.

Jefferies Financial Group has increased its dividend by an average of 13.0% annually over the last three years. Jefferies Financial Group has a payout ratio of 23.5% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Jefferies Financial Group to earn $4.79 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.40 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 29.2%.

Jefferies Financial Group Price Performance

JEF opened at $80.11 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average of $76.80 and a 200 day moving average of $64.58. The company has a quick ratio of 1.03, a current ratio of 1.03 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.53. The stock has a market cap of $16.46 billion, a P/E ratio of 34.24 and a beta of 1.35. Jefferies Financial Group has a 52-week low of $38.77 and a 52-week high of $82.68.

Jefferies Financial Group (NYSE:JEF) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The financial services provider reported $0.91 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.97 by ($0.06). Jefferies Financial Group had a return on equity of 6.40% and a net margin of 9.27%. The business had revenue of $1.96 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.83 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $0.30 EPS. Jefferies Financial Group’s revenue for the quarter was up 63.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Jefferies Financial Group will post 3.13 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity at Jefferies Financial Group

In other Jefferies Financial Group news, Director Robert D. Beyer sold 46,200 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, October 31st. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.07, for a total value of $2,960,034.00. Following the transaction, the director now owns 100,375 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,431,026.25. This represents a 31.52 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, CEO Richard B. Handler sold 400,000 shares of Jefferies Financial Group stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, November 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $72.26, for a total transaction of $28,904,000.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 14,971,288 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,081,825,270.88. This represents a 2.60 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 1,086,923 shares of company stock valued at $76,381,151. 20.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

JEF has been the subject of several recent research reports. UBS Group assumed coverage on shares of Jefferies Financial Group in a report on Tuesday, September 17th. They set a “buy” rating and a $67.00 target price for the company. Morgan Stanley raised shares of Jefferies Financial Group from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price objective for the company from $67.00 to $97.00 in a report on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Oppenheimer lowered their price target on Jefferies Financial Group from $82.00 to $81.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, January 3rd.

About Jefferies Financial Group

Jefferies Financial Group Inc operates as an investment banking and capital markets firm in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific. The company operates in two segments, Investment Banking and Capital Markets, and Asset Management. It provides investment banking, advisory services with respect to mergers or acquisitions, debt financing, restructurings or recapitalizations, and private capital advisory transactions; underwriting and placement services related to corporate debt, municipal bonds, mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities, equity and equity-linked securities, and loan syndication services; and corporate lending services.