Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.30

Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, March 27th, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 16th will be paid a dividend of 0.30 per share on Tuesday, May 28th. This represents a $1.20 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.46%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 15th.

Equinor ASA has increased its dividend by an average of 71.8% annually over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 1 years. Equinor ASA has a payout ratio of 112.1% indicating that the company cannot currently cover its dividend with earnings alone and is relying on its balance sheet to cover its dividend payments. Analysts expect Equinor ASA to earn $3.15 per share next year, which means the company may not be able to cover its $3.60 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 114.3%.

Equinor ASA Stock Up 1.0 %

EQNR stock opened at $26.91 on Thursday. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $26.68 and its 200 day moving average price is $30.27. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51, a quick ratio of 1.60 and a current ratio of 1.71. Equinor ASA has a fifty-two week low of $24.44 and a fifty-two week high of $34.73. The firm has a market capitalization of $84.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 6.88 and a beta of 0.84.

Equinor ASA (NYSE:EQNR) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 7th. The company reported $0.64 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.08 by ($0.44). Equinor ASA had a return on equity of 20.32% and a net margin of 11.09%. The firm had revenue of $29.05 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $27.35 billion. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Equinor ASA will post 3.26 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Institutional Trading of Equinor ASA

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership increased its position in Equinor ASA by 42.8% during the 1st quarter. Arrowstreet Capital Limited Partnership now owns 10,186,246 shares of the company’s stock worth $382,086,000 after purchasing an additional 3,052,907 shares in the last quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. grew its holdings in Equinor ASA by 47.6% in the 2nd quarter. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. now owns 3,752,274 shares of the company’s stock valued at $130,429,000 after buying an additional 1,210,930 shares during the period. Renaissance Technologies LLC purchased a new stake in Equinor ASA in the 1st quarter valued at about $55,819,000. BlackRock Inc. grew its holdings in Equinor ASA by 9.0% in the 2nd quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 1,195,377 shares of the company’s stock valued at $34,917,000 after buying an additional 98,548 shares during the period. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada grew its holdings in Equinor ASA by 78.5% in the 1st quarter. Royal Bank of Canada now owns 1,147,514 shares of the company’s stock valued at $43,045,000 after buying an additional 504,804 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 5.51% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on the company. Bank of America raised Equinor ASA from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, December 7th. Royal Bank of Canada downgraded Equinor ASA from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 19th. Morgan Stanley raised Equinor ASA from an “underweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and raised their target price for the company from $26.40 to $28.50 in a report on Tuesday, February 20th. TD Cowen initiated coverage on Equinor ASA in a report on Wednesday, January 10th. They issued a “market perform” rating and a $28.00 target price for the company. Finally, DZ Bank downgraded Equinor ASA from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 8th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Equinor ASA currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $28.25.

Equinor ASA Company Profile

Equinor ASA, an energy company, engages in the exploration, production, transportation, refining, and marketing of petroleum and other forms of energy in Norway and internationally. It operates through Exploration & Production Norway; Exploration & Production International; Exploration & Production USA; Marketing, Midstream & Processing; Renewables; and Other segments.