Gray Television (NYSE:GTN) Posts Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.25 EPS

Gray Television (NYSE:GTN) posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday. The company reported $0.79 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.54 by $0.25, Briefing.com reports. The business had revenue of $823.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $824.98 million. Gray Television had a negative return on equity of 3.76% and a negative net margin of 2.32%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 2.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the company earned ($0.48) earnings per share.

Gray Television Trading Up 0.9 %

Shares of Gray Television stock traded up $0.06 during trading hours on Wednesday, reaching $6.76. The stock had a trading volume of 680,643 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,125,931. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $5.91 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $7.39. The firm has a market capitalization of $657.07 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of -4.79, a P/E/G ratio of 0.15 and a beta of 1.55. The company has a current ratio of 1.18, a quick ratio of 1.18 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.12. Gray Television has a 1 year low of $5.44 and a 1 year high of $10.69.

Gray Television Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 28th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 15th were issued a $0.08 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 14th. This represents a $0.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.73%. Gray Television’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is -23.02%.

Insider Transactions at Gray Television

In other news, CEO Hilton H. Howell, Jr. acquired 10,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, March 28th. The shares were bought at an average cost of $8.09 per share, for a total transaction of $80,900.00. Following the acquisition, the chief executive officer now directly owns 2,982,386 shares in the company, valued at approximately $24,127,502.74. The purchase was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Company insiders own 13.83% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms recently commented on GTN. Wells Fargo & Company increased their price objective on Gray Television from $5.50 to $6.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Barrington Research reissued a “market perform” rating on shares of Gray Television in a research note on Tuesday, February 27th. Finally, Benchmark raised their price target on Gray Television from $11.00 to $13.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Gray Television has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $11.40.

Gray Television Company Profile

Gray Television, Inc, a television broadcasting company, owns and/or operates television stations and digital assets in the United States. It also broadcasts secondary digital channels affiliated to ABC, CBS, NBC, and FOX, as well as various other networks and program services, including CW Plus Network, MY Network, the MeTV Network, Circle, Telemundo, THE365, and Outlaw; and local news/weather channels in various markets.