Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.40

Jefferies Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:JEF) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, March 26th, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Monday, May 19th will be paid a dividend of 0.40 per share by the financial services provider on Thursday, May 29th. This represents a $1.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.65%.

Jefferies Financial Group has increased its dividend payment by an average of 13.0% per year over the last three years. Jefferies Financial Group has a payout ratio of 28.6% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Jefferies Financial Group to earn $6.16 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.60 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 26.0%.

Jefferies Financial Group Price Performance

JEF opened at $60.33 on Thursday. Jefferies Financial Group has a fifty-two week low of $40.72 and a fifty-two week high of $82.68. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $67.40 and a 200 day moving average of $69.52. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.57, a quick ratio of 1.07 and a current ratio of 1.07. The firm has a market cap of $12.44 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.25 and a beta of 1.37.

Jefferies Financial Group (NYSE:JEF) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, March 26th. The financial services provider reported $0.57 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.88 by ($0.31). Jefferies Financial Group had a net margin of 10.57% and a return on equity of 7.92%. The company had revenue of $1.59 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.93 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.87 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was down 8.4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts expect that Jefferies Financial Group will post 4.41 EPS for the current year.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

JEF has been the subject of several research reports. Oppenheimer downgraded Jefferies Financial Group from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, March 19th. The Goldman Sachs Group set a $75.00 target price on shares of Jefferies Financial Group in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th. Finally, Morgan Stanley lowered their price target on shares of Jefferies Financial Group from $92.00 to $81.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, March 13th.

Jefferies Financial Group Company Profile

Jefferies Financial Group Inc operates as an investment banking and capital markets firm in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific. The company operates in two segments, Investment Banking and Capital Markets, and Asset Management. It provides investment banking, advisory services with respect to mergers or acquisitions, debt financing, restructurings or recapitalizations, and private capital advisory transactions; underwriting and placement services related to corporate debt, municipal bonds, mortgage-backed and asset-backed securities, equity and equity-linked securities, and loan syndication services; and corporate lending services.