Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) Posts Quarterly Earnings Results, Beats Expectations By $0.05 EPS

Assured Guaranty (NYSE:AGO) announced its earnings results on Wednesday. The financial services provider reported $1.44 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.39 by $0.05, Briefing.com reports. Assured Guaranty had a return on equity of 12.48% and a net margin of 57.45%. The firm had revenue of $202.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $193.05 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.60 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 43.9% compared to the same quarter last year.

Assured Guaranty Stock Down 0.6 %

Shares of AGO traded down $0.48 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $74.00. The stock had a trading volume of 408,585 shares, compared to its average volume of 397,703. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $78.42 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $81.32. Assured Guaranty has a twelve month low of $56.77 and a twelve month high of $96.60. The firm has a market cap of $4.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 5.71 and a beta of 1.11. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.30, a current ratio of 0.97 and a quick ratio of 0.97.

Assured Guaranty Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 4th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, August 21st will be paid a $0.31 dividend. This represents a $1.24 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.68%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, August 21st. Assured Guaranty’s dividend payout ratio is 9.58%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on AGO shares. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised Assured Guaranty from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and increased their target price for the stock from $87.00 to $92.00 in a report on Tuesday, July 9th. Roth Mkm restated a “buy” rating and set a $110.00 price target on shares of Assured Guaranty in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on Assured Guaranty from $102.00 to $84.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday.

Insider Activity at Assured Guaranty

In related news, CEO Dominic Frederico sold 40,000 shares of Assured Guaranty stock in a transaction dated Thursday, June 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $78.12, for a total value of $3,124,800.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 1,410,824 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $110,213,570.88. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. 5.10% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Assured Guaranty Company Profile

Assured Guaranty Ltd., together with its subsidiaries, provides credit protection products to public finance, infrastructure, and structured finance markets in the United States and internationally. It operates through two segments: Insurance and Asset Management. The company offers financial guaranty insurance that protects holders of debt instruments and other monetary obligations from defaults in scheduled payments.