Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) Declares $0.12 Quarterly Dividend

Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, December 18th,Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 30th will be paid a dividend of 0.115 per share by the semiconductor manufacturer on Wednesday, January 15th. This represents a $0.46 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.52%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, December 30th.

Micron Technology has a payout ratio of 6.1% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Micron Technology to earn $12.58 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.46 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 3.7%.

Micron Technology Stock Performance

Shares of MU opened at $88.63 on Friday. Micron Technology has a one year low of $79.15 and a one year high of $157.54. The company has a market cap of $98.75 billion, a PE ratio of 130.34 and a beta of 1.16. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $101.17 and a 200-day moving average of $107.22. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.29, a current ratio of 2.64 and a quick ratio of 1.68.

Micron Technology (NASDAQ:MU) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, December 18th. The semiconductor manufacturer reported $1.79 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.60 by $0.19. Micron Technology had a return on equity of 1.58% and a net margin of 3.10%. The firm had revenue of $8.71 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.71 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted ($0.95) earnings per share. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 84.3% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts predict that Micron Technology will post 8.31 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Micron Technology news, EVP April S. Arnzen sold 4,890 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $85.21, for a total transaction of $416,676.90. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 181,223 shares in the company, valued at $15,442,011.83. This represents a 2.63 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. 0.30% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms have weighed in on MU. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “buy” rating and issued a $250.00 price objective on shares of Micron Technology in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Morgan Stanley cut their price target on Micron Technology from $114.00 to $98.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Susquehanna lowered their price objective on Micron Technology from $175.00 to $165.00 and set a “positive” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, September 26th. Barclays cut their target price on Micron Technology from $145.00 to $110.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Finally, BNP Paribas lowered Micron Technology from an “outperform” rating to an “underperform” rating and lowered their price target for the company from $140.00 to $67.00 in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating and twenty-three have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $135.24.

Micron Technology Company Profile

Micron Technology, Inc designs, develops, manufactures, and sells memory and storage products worldwide. The company operates through four segments: Compute and Networking Business Unit, Mobile Business Unit, Embedded Business Unit, and Storage Business Unit. It provides memory and storage technologies comprising dynamic random access memory semiconductor devices with low latency that provide high-speed data retrieval; non-volatile and re-writeable semiconductor storage devices; and non-volatile re-writable semiconductor memory devices that provide fast read speeds under the Micron and Crucial brands, as well as through private labels.