ServisFirst Bancshares, Inc. (NYSE:SFBS) Plans Quarterly Dividend of $0.34

ServisFirst Bancshares, Inc. (NYSE:SFBS) announced a quarterly dividend on Monday, December 16th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Thursday, January 2nd will be paid a dividend of 0.335 per share by the financial services provider on Friday, January 10th. This represents a $1.34 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.42%. This is a positive change from ServisFirst Bancshares’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.30.

ServisFirst Bancshares has raised its dividend payment by an average of 16.3% annually over the last three years. ServisFirst Bancshares has a payout ratio of 23.7% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect ServisFirst Bancshares to earn $5.01 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.20 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 24.0%.

ServisFirst Bancshares Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:SFBS traded up $1.36 during midday trading on Monday, hitting $94.36. The company had a trading volume of 182,494 shares, compared to its average volume of 203,231. The company has a fifty day moving average of $90.11 and a two-hundred day moving average of $78.57. ServisFirst Bancshares has a 12-month low of $58.05 and a 12-month high of $101.37. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.04, a current ratio of 0.95 and a quick ratio of 0.95. The company has a market cap of $5.15 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.24 and a beta of 0.88.

ServisFirst Bancshares (NYSE:SFBS) last released its quarterly earnings data on Monday, October 21st. The financial services provider reported $1.10 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.97 by $0.13. ServisFirst Bancshares had a return on equity of 14.23% and a net margin of 21.16%. The firm had revenue of $256.53 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $120.70 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $0.98 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that ServisFirst Bancshares will post 4.09 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In related news, COO Rodney Eldon Rushing sold 12,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, September 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $80.58, for a total transaction of $966,960.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 307,837 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $24,805,505.46. This trade represents a 3.75 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, SVP Henry Fulbrook Abbott sold 1,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, October 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $85.20, for a total transaction of $85,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now directly owns 8,501 shares in the company, valued at approximately $724,285.20. The trade was a 10.53 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Corporate insiders own 7.40% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several research firms recently commented on SFBS. Piper Sandler boosted their price objective on shares of ServisFirst Bancshares from $76.00 to $79.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 22nd. StockNews.com lowered shares of ServisFirst Bancshares from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Sunday, November 24th. Finally, Hovde Group boosted their target price on ServisFirst Bancshares from $80.00 to $91.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 22nd.

About ServisFirst Bancshares

ServisFirst Bancshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for ServisFirst Bank that provides various banking services to individual and corporate customers. It accepts demand, time, savings, and other deposits; checking, money market, and IRA accounts; and certificates of deposit. The company's loan products include commercial lending products, including seasonal, bridge, and term loans for working capital, expansion of the business, acquisition of property, and plant and equipment, as well as commercial lines of credit; commercial real estate loans, construction and development loans, and residential real estate loans; and consumer loans, such as home equity loans, vehicle financing, loans secured by deposits, and secured and unsecured personal loans.