Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.43

Fortis Inc. (NYSE:FTS) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, July 30th, Zacks reports. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, August 20th will be paid a dividend of 0.431 per share by the utilities provider on Sunday, September 1st. This represents a $1.72 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.09%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, August 20th.

Fortis has increased its dividend by an average of 5.7% annually over the last three years. Fortis has a dividend payout ratio of 70.7% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Fortis to earn $2.39 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.71 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 71.5%.

Fortis Stock Performance

Shares of Fortis stock opened at $42.11 on Thursday. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $39.69 and its 200-day simple moving average is $39.59. The stock has a market capitalization of $20.85 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.04, a PEG ratio of 2.95 and a beta of 0.45. Fortis has a 12 month low of $36.30 and a 12 month high of $42.78. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.24, a current ratio of 0.60 and a quick ratio of 0.52.

Fortis (NYSE:FTS) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, May 1st. The utilities provider reported $0.69 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.65 by $0.04. The business had revenue of $2.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.43 billion. Fortis had a net margin of 13.66% and a return on equity of 7.02%. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Fortis will post 2.33 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, StockNews.com cut shares of Fortis from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Saturday, July 27th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $55.13.

Fortis Company Profile

Fortis Inc operates as an electric and gas utility company in Canada, the United States, and the Caribbean countries. It generates, transmits, and distributes electricity to approximately 447,000 retail customers in southeastern Arizona; and 103,000 retail customers in Arizona's Mohave and Santa Cruz counties with an aggregate capacity of 3,408 megawatts (MW), including 68 MW of solar capacity and 250 MV of wind capacity.