American States Water (NYSE:AWR) Declares Quarterly Dividend of $0.47

American States Water (NYSE:AWR) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, February 6th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Tuesday, February 18th will be paid a dividend of 0.4655 per share by the utilities provider on Monday, March 3rd. This represents a $1.86 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.55%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, February 18th.

American States Water has raised its dividend by an average of 8.6% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 23 consecutive years. American States Water has a payout ratio of 52.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect American States Water to earn $3.34 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.86 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 55.7%.

American States Water Stock Performance

Shares of AWR opened at $72.97 on Friday. American States Water has a one year low of $66.03 and a one year high of $87.50. The company has a 50-day moving average of $76.95 and a two-hundred day moving average of $81.00. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.86, a current ratio of 0.69 and a quick ratio of 0.64. The stock has a market cap of $2.73 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.57, a PEG ratio of 12.59 and a beta of 0.53.

American States Water (NYSE:AWR) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, November 6th. The utilities provider reported $0.95 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.98 by ($0.03). The firm had revenue of $161.78 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $161.00 million. American States Water had a return on equity of 13.53% and a net margin of 19.26%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $0.85 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts expect that American States Water will post 3.01 earnings per share for the current year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

AWR has been the subject of several research analyst reports. StockNews.com downgraded American States Water from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research note on Wednesday, November 27th. Bank of America lowered American States Water from a “neutral” rating to an “underperform” rating and reduced their target price for the stock from $85.00 to $71.00 in a report on Monday, February 3rd. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company cut shares of American States Water from an “equal weight” rating to an “underweight” rating and reduced their price objective for the stock from $84.00 to $77.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 7th.

About American States Water

American States Water Company, through its subsidiaries, provides water and electric services to residential, commercial, industrial, and other customers in the United States. It operates through three segments: Water, Electric, and Contracted Services. The company purchases, produces, distributes, and sells water, as well as distributes electricity.