Business First Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:BFST) Declares $0.14 Quarterly Dividend

Business First Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:BFST) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, January 24th,Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Saturday, February 15th will be given a dividend of 0.14 per share on Friday, February 28th. This represents a $0.56 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.02%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 14th.

Business First Bancshares has increased its dividend by an average of 6.8% annually over the last three years. Business First Bancshares has a dividend payout ratio of 18.9% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Business First Bancshares to earn $2.54 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.56 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 22.0%.

Business First Bancshares Stock Up 8.8 %

NASDAQ:BFST traded up $2.25 on Friday, reaching $27.69. 250,077 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 122,430. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $26.64 and its 200 day simple moving average is $25.40. The company has a market capitalization of $817.96 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 11.94 and a beta of 1.00. Business First Bancshares has a 12 month low of $18.97 and a 12 month high of $30.30. The company has a current ratio of 0.99, a quick ratio of 0.99 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.75.

Business First Bancshares (NASDAQ:BFST) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, January 23rd. The company reported $0.66 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.49 by $0.17. Business First Bancshares had a net margin of 14.92% and a return on equity of 11.57%. Equities analysts predict that Business First Bancshares will post 2.27 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Business First Bancshares news, Director Joseph Vernon Johnson sold 6,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $26.36, for a total value of $158,160.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 185,557 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,891,282.52. This trade represents a 3.13 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Insiders have sold a total of 12,480 shares of company stock worth $329,972 in the last 90 days. 6.45% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several brokerages recently issued reports on BFST. Hovde Group upgraded shares of Business First Bancshares from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $31.50 to $33.00 in a research report on Friday. Raymond James upgraded Business First Bancshares from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and set a $30.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Thursday, December 19th.

About Business First Bancshares

Business First Bancshares, Inc operates as the bank holding company for b1BANK that provides various banking products and services in Louisiana and Texas. It offers various deposit products and services, including checking, demand, money market, time, and savings accounts; and certificates of deposits, remote deposit capture, and direct deposit services.