Griffon Co. (GFF) To Go Ex-Dividend on November 25th

Griffon Co. (NYSE:GFF) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, November 13th,RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Monday, November 25th will be paid a dividend of 0.18 per share by the conglomerate on Wednesday, December 18th. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.87%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, November 25th. This is a positive change from Griffon’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.15.

Griffon has increased its dividend by an average of 17.9% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 12 years. Griffon has a dividend payout ratio of 13.0% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Griffon to earn $6.43 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.72 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 11.2%.

Griffon Trading Up 2.1 %

Shares of GFF opened at $82.98 on Friday. Griffon has a twelve month low of $45.70 and a twelve month high of $83.76. The company has a market cap of $3.97 billion, a P/E ratio of 19.62 and a beta of 1.31. The company has a current ratio of 2.66, a quick ratio of 1.44 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 6.74. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $68.69 and its 200-day simple moving average is $67.10.

Griffon (NYSE:GFF) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 13th. The conglomerate reported $1.47 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.18 by $0.29. The company had revenue of $659.70 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $641.24 million. Griffon had a net margin of 8.00% and a return on equity of 108.70%. The firm’s revenue was up 2.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.19 EPS. As a group, analysts expect that Griffon will post 5.57 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Griffon news, Director James W. Sight sold 3,660 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $76.42, for a total transaction of $279,697.20. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 16,708 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,276,825.36. This trade represents a 17.97 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, Director Kevin F. Sullivan sold 9,222 shares of Griffon stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $75.50, for a total transaction of $696,261.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 41,168 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,108,184. This trade represents a 18.30 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 603,517 shares of company stock worth $42,818,506 in the last three months. Corporate insiders own 16.10% of the company’s stock.

Griffon declared that its board has approved a share repurchase plan on Wednesday, November 13th that allows the company to buyback $400.00 million in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization allows the conglomerate to buy up to 10.1% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback plans are often a sign that the company’s board believes its stock is undervalued.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on GFF shares. Robert W. Baird raised their price target on shares of Griffon from $92.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Griffon from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Saturday. Finally, Stephens raised their price target on shares of Griffon from $85.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, November 14th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $89.25.

Griffon Company Profile

Griffon Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides consumer and professional, and home and building products in the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia, and internationally. The company operates through two segments: Home and Building Products, and Consumer and Professional Products. The Home and Building Products segment manufactures and markets residential and commercial sectional garage doors, rolling steel service doors, fire doors, shutters, steel security grilles, and room dividers for the use in commercial construction and repair, and home remodeling applications.