Cognex Co. Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.08 (NASDAQ:CGNX)

Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, July 31st, Zacks reports. Stockholders of record on Thursday, August 15th will be given a dividend of 0.075 per share by the scientific and technical instruments company on Thursday, August 29th. This represents a $0.30 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.79%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, August 15th.

Cognex has raised its dividend payment by an average of 8.2% annually over the last three years. Cognex has a payout ratio of 26.3% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Cognex to earn $0.87 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.30 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 34.5%.

Cognex Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ CGNX traded down $1.27 during trading on Friday, hitting $37.81. The stock had a trading volume of 549,626 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,339,949. Cognex has a 12 month low of $34.28 and a 12 month high of $53.13. The company has a market capitalization of $6.49 billion, a PE ratio of 65.53 and a beta of 1.42. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $47.31 and a two-hundred day moving average of $42.95.

Cognex (NASDAQ:CGNX) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $0.17 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.14 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $239.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $240.33 million. Cognex had a net margin of 9.29% and a return on equity of 4.98%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was down 1.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.32 EPS. On average, equities analysts expect that Cognex will post 0.46 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts have commented on the stock. Citigroup upped their price objective on shares of Cognex from $41.00 to $43.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, April 8th. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Cognex from $40.00 to $44.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, May 3rd. Stephens upped their price objective on shares of Cognex from $40.00 to $45.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, May 3rd. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their price objective on shares of Cognex from $36.00 to $41.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a report on Monday, May 6th. Finally, HSBC raised shares of Cognex from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $52.00 price target on the stock in a report on Tuesday, May 7th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have issued a hold rating, seven have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $50.14.

Cognex Company Profile

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process.