Ares Commercial Real Estate Co. Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.25 (NYSE:ACRE)

Ares Commercial Real Estate Co. (NYSE:ACRE) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, May 9th, Zacks reports. Investors of record on Friday, June 28th will be paid a dividend of 0.25 per share by the real estate investment trust on Tuesday, July 16th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 14.09%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, June 28th.

Ares Commercial Real Estate has a payout ratio of 142.9% 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 Ares Commercial Real Estate to earn $0.85 per share next year, which means the company may not be able to cover its $1.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 117.6%.

Ares Commercial Real Estate Trading Up 1.2 %

Shares of Ares Commercial Real Estate stock opened at $7.10 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.29, a current ratio of 0.95 and a quick ratio of 0.95. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $6.90 and a 200 day simple moving average of $8.15. Ares Commercial Real Estate has a fifty-two week low of $6.36 and a fifty-two week high of $11.24.

Ares Commercial Real Estate (NYSE:ACRE) last released its earnings results on Thursday, May 9th. The real estate investment trust reported ($0.64) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.30) by ($0.34). The firm had revenue of $18.69 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $43.77 million. Ares Commercial Real Estate had a positive return on equity of 0.84% and a negative net margin of 54.60%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.26 EPS. On average, analysts anticipate that Ares Commercial Real Estate will post -2.4 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently issued reports on ACRE. TheStreet lowered Ares Commercial Real Estate from a “c-” rating to a “d+” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 5th. Bank of America restated an “underperform” rating and set a $7.00 price objective (down previously from $11.00) on shares of Ares Commercial Real Estate in a report on Monday, March 4th. StockNews.com lowered Ares Commercial Real Estate from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Monday, May 27th. UBS Group decreased their target price on Ares Commercial Real Estate from $10.50 to $8.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, March 20th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on Ares Commercial Real Estate from $8.00 to $7.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and six have given a hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $8.42.

About Ares Commercial Real Estate

Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation, a specialty finance company, originates and invests in commercial real estate (CRE) loans and related investments in the United States. It provides a range of financing solutions for the owners, operators, and sponsors of CRE properties. The company originates senior mortgage loans, subordinate debt and preferred equity products, mezzanine loans, and other CRE investments, including commercial mortgage-backed securities.