TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) Declares Dividend Increase – $0.04 Per Share

TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, April 30th, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Saturday, June 1st will be given a dividend of 0.0438 per share by the utilities provider on Monday, July 1st. This represents a $0.18 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.62%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 31st. This is an increase from TransAlta’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.04.

TransAlta has increased its dividend by an average of 14.2% per year over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 1 years. TransAlta has a payout ratio of 60.0% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect TransAlta to earn $0.53 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.18 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 34.0%.

TransAlta Stock Performance

Shares of TAC opened at $6.69 on Thursday. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $6.55 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $7.34. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.06, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a current ratio of 0.91. TransAlta has a twelve month low of $5.94 and a twelve month high of $10.40. The firm has a market cap of $2.05 billion, a P/E ratio of 3.65 and a beta of 0.83.

TransAlta (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, February 23rd. The utilities provider reported ($0.20) earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.10 by ($0.30). The firm had revenue of $624.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $305.79 million. TransAlta had a net margin of 20.05% and a return on equity of 48.42%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was down 26.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned ($0.45) EPS. On average, analysts forecast that TransAlta will post 0.51 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Separately, StockNews.com downgraded shares of TransAlta from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, January 12th.

About TransAlta

TransAlta Corporation engages in the development, production, and sale of electric energy. It operates through Hydro, Wind and Solar, Gas, Energy Transition, and Energy Marketing segments. The Hydro segment holds interest of approximately 922 megawatts (MW) of owned hydroelectric generating capacity located in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario.