Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYX) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.98

Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYX) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, January 10th,RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 7th will be given a dividend of 0.98 per share by the business services provider on Thursday, February 27th. This represents a $3.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.62%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 7th.

Paychex has increased its dividend payment by an average of 13.2% per year over the last three years. Paychex has a dividend payout ratio of 69.3% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Paychex to earn $5.31 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.92 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 73.8%.

Paychex Trading Up 0.6 %

PAYX opened at $149.51 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $53.83 billion, a PE ratio of 31.48, a P/E/G ratio of 4.03 and a beta of 1.00. The firm’s fifty day moving average price is $142.83 and its 200 day moving average price is $137.71. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20, a current ratio of 1.39 and a quick ratio of 1.39. Paychex has a 12-month low of $114.72 and a 12-month high of $150.71.

Paychex (NASDAQ:PAYX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The business services provider reported $1.14 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.12 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.32 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.31 billion. Paychex had a net margin of 32.02% and a return on equity of 45.28%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 4.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.08 earnings per share. As a group, research analysts expect that Paychex will post 4.99 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

PAYX has been the subject of several recent research reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on shares of Paychex from $133.00 to $139.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 19th. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Paychex from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Monday, December 23rd. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reiterated a “sector perform” rating and set a $148.00 target price on shares of Paychex in a research note on Friday, December 20th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and eleven have assigned a hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $132.23.

About Paychex

Paychex, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides integrated human capital management solutions (HCM) for payroll, benefits, human resources (HR), and insurance services for small to medium-sized businesses in the United States, Europe, and India. It offers payroll processing services; payroll tax administration services; employee payment services; and regulatory compliance services, such as new-hire reporting and garnishment processing.