Graco Inc. (NYSE:GGG) Raises Dividend to $0.28 Per Share

Graco Inc. (NYSE:GGG - Get Free Report) declared a quarterly dividend on Friday, December 6th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Monday, January 20th will be paid a dividend of 0.275 per share by the industrial products company on Wednesday, February 5th. This represents a $1.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.23%. This is an increase from Graco's previous quarterly dividend of $0.26.

Graco has raised its dividend payment by an average of 10.3% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 28 years. Graco has a dividend payout ratio of 33.2% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Graco to earn $3.06 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.02 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 33.3%.

Graco Price Performance

NYSE GGG traded up $0.52 during mid-day trading on Friday, reaching $89.62. The stock had a trading volume of 312,111 shares, compared to its average volume of 746,360. Graco has a 1 year low of $77.49 and a 1 year high of $94.77. The stock has a market cap of $15.13 billion, a PE ratio of 31.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.15 and a beta of 0.83. The company has a fifty day moving average price of $86.89 and a 200 day moving average price of $83.20.

Graco (NYSE:GGG - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 23rd. The industrial products company reported $0.71 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of $0.76 by ($0.05). The firm had revenue of $519.21 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $538.19 million. Graco had a return on equity of 21.24% and a net margin of 22.87%. Graco's revenue was down 3.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.76 earnings per share. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Graco will post 2.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, EVP Kathryn L. Schoenrock sold 1,527 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, November 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $90.30, for a total transaction of $137,888.10. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 6,374 shares in the company, valued at approximately $575,572.20. This represents a 19.33 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider David J. Thompson sold 3,216 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, November 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $88.31, for a total transaction of $284,004.96. Following the sale, the insider now owns 27,246 shares in the company, valued at $2,406,094.26. This represents a 10.56 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 31,098 shares of company stock valued at $2,776,150. Company insiders own 2.63% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have weighed in on GGG. Robert W. Baird decreased their target price on shares of Graco from $88.00 to $85.00 and set a "neutral" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, October 25th. DA Davidson restated a "neutral" rating and issued a $79.00 price objective on shares of Graco in a research note on Friday, September 27th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reduced their price objective on Graco from $96.00 to $93.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $89.25.

About Graco

Graco Inc designs, manufactures, and markets systems and equipment used to move, measure, control, dispense, and spray fluid and powder materials worldwide. The Contractor segment offers sprayers to apply paint to walls and other structures; two-component proportioning systems that are used to spray polyurethane foam and polyurea coatings; and viscous coatings to roofs, as well as markings on roads, parking lots, athletic fields, and floors.

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