Matson, Inc. Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.34 (NYSE:MATX)

Matson, Inc. (NYSE:MATX) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, January 23rd,RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Thursday, February 6th will be given a dividend of 0.34 per share by the shipping company on Thursday, March 6th. This represents a $1.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.98%.

Matson has increased its dividend by an average of 7.6% annually over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 12 years. Matson has a payout ratio of 14.2% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Matson to earn $9.80 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.36 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 13.9%.

Matson Trading Up 0.4 %

Matson stock opened at $138.62 on Friday. Matson has a 1 year low of $100.50 and a 1 year high of $169.12. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $144.80 and its 200-day moving average price is $138.98. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.14, a current ratio of 1.13 and a quick ratio of 1.13. The stock has a market cap of $4.60 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.53 and a beta of 1.07.

Matson (NYSE:MATX) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The shipping company reported $5.89 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.98 by $0.91. The company had revenue of $962.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $965.73 million. Matson had a net margin of 12.37% and a return on equity of 16.89%. Matson’s revenue for the quarter was up 16.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $3.40 EPS. On average, equities analysts predict that Matson will post 13.19 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Leonard P. Isotoff sold 492 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, November 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $161.26, for a total transaction of $79,339.92. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now owns 4,254 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $686,000.04. The trade was a 10.37 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, SVP John Warren Sullivan sold 750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $165.50, for a total value of $124,125.00. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 12,745 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,109,297.50. This represents a 5.56 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 9,646 shares of company stock worth $1,578,768. 2.32% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently commented on MATX. Stephens reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $165.00 target price on shares of Matson in a research report on Thursday, January 2nd. Wolfe Research cut Matson from an “outperform” rating to a “peer perform” rating in a report on Monday, November 18th.

Matson Company Profile

Matson, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the provision of ocean transportation and logistics services. It operates through two segments, Ocean Transportation and Logistics. The Ocean Transportation segment offers ocean freight transportation services to the domestic non-contiguous economies of Hawaii, Japan, Alaska, and Guam, as well as to other island economies in Micronesia.