Citizens & Northern (NASDAQ:CZNC) Raised to Buy at StockNews.com

StockNews.com upgraded shares of Citizens & Northern (NASDAQ:CZNC) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a report issued on Thursday morning.

Separately, Piper Sandler raised Citizens & Northern to a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, December 2nd.

Citizens & Northern Stock Up 2.8 %

CZNC stock opened at $21.82 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $336.25 million, a P/E ratio of 12.91 and a beta of 0.49. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $19.59 and its 200 day simple moving average is $19.57. Citizens & Northern has a fifty-two week low of $16.50 and a fifty-two week high of $22.68. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.77, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a current ratio of 0.95.

Citizens & Northern (NASDAQ:CZNC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, January 23rd. The financial services provider reported $0.53 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.45 by $0.08. Citizens & Northern had a net margin of 16.50% and a return on equity of 9.71%. On average, research analysts expect that Citizens & Northern will post 1.91 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Citizens & Northern Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Monday, February 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.28 per share. This is a positive change from Citizens & Northern’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.27. This represents a $1.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 5.13%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, February 3rd. Citizens & Northern’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 66.27%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Citizens & Northern

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. SG Americas Securities LLC purchased a new position in shares of Citizens & Northern in the 3rd quarter worth approximately $102,000. Stone House Investment Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of Citizens & Northern by 11.0% in the 3rd quarter. Stone House Investment Management LLC now owns 95,255 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,876,000 after buying an additional 9,470 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp grew its position in Citizens & Northern by 1.1% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 308,868 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $6,082,000 after buying an additional 3,297 shares during the period. Barclays PLC increased its holdings in Citizens & Northern by 290.1% during the third quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 19,388 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $381,000 after buying an additional 14,418 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC raised its position in Citizens & Northern by 1.2% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 345,823 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $6,811,000 after acquiring an additional 4,243 shares during the period. 30.83% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About Citizens & Northern

Citizens & Northern Corp. is a holding company, which engages in community banking. It provides a full range of banking and mortgage services to individual and corporate customers in North Central Pennsylvania and Southern New York State. The firm’s lending products include mortgage loans, commercial loans, and consumer loans.