Dime Community Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:DCOM) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.25

Dime Community Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:DCOM) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, December 17th,RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 17th will be paid a dividend of 0.25 per share by the savings and loans company on Friday, January 24th. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.20%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 17th.

Dime Community Bancshares has raised its dividend by an average of 1.4% per year over the last three years. Dime Community Bancshares has a payout ratio of 25.4% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Dime Community Bancshares to earn $2.78 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 36.0%.

Dime Community Bancshares Trading Up 4.5 %

Shares of DCOM stock opened at $31.25 on Wednesday. Dime Community Bancshares has a fifty-two week low of $17.29 and a fifty-two week high of $37.60. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a current ratio of 1.01. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $33.37 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $28.43. The company has a market cap of $1.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.83 and a beta of 1.05.

Dime Community Bancshares (NASDAQ:DCOM) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The savings and loans company reported $0.29 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.41 by ($0.12). Dime Community Bancshares had a net margin of 9.65% and a return on equity of 5.58%. The company had revenue of $171.87 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $86.65 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.56 EPS. Research analysts forecast that Dime Community Bancshares will post 1.49 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Dime Community Bancshares

In other news, CTO Michael Fegan sold 2,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.76, for a total value of $71,520.00. Following the transaction, the chief technology officer now owns 20,155 shares in the company, valued at $720,742.80. This trade represents a 9.03 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Basswood Capital Management, L purchased 29,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 12th. The shares were bought at an average price of $32.00 per share, with a total value of $928,000.00. Following the acquisition, the director now directly owns 1,044,221 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $33,415,072. This represents a 2.86 % increase in their position. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Company insiders own 9.10% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on DCOM shares. StockNews.com lowered shares of Dime Community Bancshares from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Saturday, September 21st. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods upped their price target on Dime Community Bancshares from $38.00 to $42.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, December 4th. Stephens upgraded Dime Community Bancshares from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and increased their price target for the stock from $30.00 to $39.00 in a report on Monday, November 18th. Finally, Raymond James boosted their price objective on Dime Community Bancshares from $35.00 to $36.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has given a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $34.20.

About Dime Community Bancshares

Dime Community Bancshares, Inc operates as the holding company for Dime Community Bank that engages in the provision of various commercial banking and financial services. The company accepts time, savings, and demand deposits from the businesses, consumers, and local municipalities. It also offers commercial real estate loans; multi-family mortgage loans; residential mortgage loans; letters of credit; secured and unsecured commercial and consumer loans; lines of credit; home equity loans; and construction and land loans.