The Allstate Co. (NYSE:ALL) Declares Quarterly Dividend of $1.00

The Allstate Co. (NYSE:ALL) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, February 26th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 10th will be paid a dividend of 1.00 per share by the insurance provider on Tuesday, April 1st. This represents a $4.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.12%. This is an increase from Allstate’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.92.

Allstate has increased its dividend payment by an average of 4.3% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 14 consecutive years. Allstate has a dividend payout ratio of 17.4% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Allstate to earn $21.55 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.68 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 17.1%.

Allstate Trading Down 1.1 %

NYSE ALL opened at $188.35 on Thursday. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $190.05 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $190.68. The stock has a market cap of $49.87 billion, a P/E ratio of 11.09, a P/E/G ratio of 1.01 and a beta of 0.52. Allstate has a 12-month low of $153.87 and a 12-month high of $209.88. The company has a current ratio of 0.36, a quick ratio of 0.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.42.

Allstate (NYSE:ALL) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 5th. The insurance provider reported $7.67 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $5.40 by $2.27. Allstate had a return on equity of 28.20% and a net margin of 7.28%. On average, analysts forecast that Allstate will post 18.74 earnings per share for the current year.

Allstate announced that its board has approved a stock buyback program on Wednesday, February 26th that permits the company to buyback $1.50 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the insurance provider to repurchase up to 3% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Allstate news, CFO Jesse E. Merten sold 40,102 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, February 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $186.53, for a total transaction of $7,480,226.06. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 18,115 shares in the company, valued at $3,378,990.95. This represents a 68.88 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. 1.80% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have commented on ALL. Evercore ISI upgraded Allstate from an “in-line” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 8th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price objective on Allstate from $235.00 to $240.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 11th. Jefferies Financial Group upped their price target on Allstate from $231.00 to $267.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 8th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on Allstate from $186.00 to $187.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 14th. Finally, Barclays dropped their price target on Allstate from $187.00 to $183.00 and set an “underweight” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 6th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has given a hold rating, fourteen have given a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $217.94.

About Allstate

The Allstate Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides property and casualty, and other insurance products in the United States and Canada. It operates in five segments: Allstate Protection; Protection Services; Allstate Health and Benefits; Run-off Property-Liability; and Corporate and Other segments.