The Greenbrier Companies, Inc. (NYSE:GBX) to Issue $0.30 Quarterly Dividend

The Greenbrier Companies, Inc. (NYSE:GBX - Get Free Report) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, January 8th,Wall Street Journal reports. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, January 29th will be given a dividend of 0.30 per share by the transportation company on Wednesday, February 19th. This represents a $1.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.91%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, January 29th.

Greenbrier Companies has increased its dividend by an average of 3.6% per year over the last three years. Greenbrier Companies has a payout ratio of 22.7% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Greenbrier Companies to earn $5.55 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.20 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 21.6%.

Greenbrier Companies Stock Up 3.8 %

Shares of GBX traded up $2.28 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $62.72. The stock had a trading volume of 633,621 shares, compared to its average volume of 429,642. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $64.67 and a 200-day simple moving average of $54.66. Greenbrier Companies has a 1-year low of $41.40 and a 1-year high of $69.12. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.91, a current ratio of 1.58 and a quick ratio of 0.87. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.97 billion, a P/E ratio of 12.62, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.96 and a beta of 1.54.

Greenbrier Companies (NYSE:GBX - Get Free Report) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, January 8th. The transportation company reported $1.72 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $1.16 by $0.56. The company had revenue of $875.90 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $849.51 million. Greenbrier Companies had a return on equity of 10.86% and a net margin of 4.52%. Greenbrier Companies's quarterly revenue was up 8.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the business earned $0.96 EPS. Sell-side analysts predict that Greenbrier Companies will post 5.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Ricardo Galvan sold 1,388 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $62.00, for a total transaction of $86,056.00. Following the transaction, the senior vice president now directly owns 32,388 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,008,056. This represents a 4.11 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, COO William J. Krueger sold 2,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $58.78, for a total value of $117,560.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 48,714 shares of the company's stock, valued at $2,863,408.92. The trade was a 3.94 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 12,703 shares of company stock worth $790,338. 1.78% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages have recently weighed in on GBX. Susquehanna boosted their target price on Greenbrier Companies from $63.00 to $65.00 and gave the stock a "positive" rating in a research note on Monday, October 21st. Bank of America boosted their price objective on Greenbrier Companies from $60.00 to $62.00 and gave the stock an "underperform" rating in a research report on Thursday. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $63.00.

About Greenbrier Companies

The Greenbrier Companies, Inc designs, manufactures, and markets railroad freight car equipment in North America, Europe, and South America. It operates through three segments: Manufacturing; Maintenance Services; and Leasing & Management Services. The Manufacturing segment offers covered hopper cars, gondolas, open top hoppers, boxcars, center partition cars, tank cars, sustainable conversions, double-stack railcars, auto-max ii, multi-max, and multi-max plus products, intermodal cars, automobile transport, coil steel and metals, flat cars, sliding wall cars, pressurized tank cars, and non-pressurized tank cars.