Crown Castle Inc. (CCI) To Go Ex-Dividend on September 13th

Crown Castle Inc. (NYSE:CCI) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, August 7th, Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, September 13th will be given a dividend of 1.565 per share by the real estate investment trust on Monday, September 30th. This represents a $6.26 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 5.22%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, September 13th.

Crown Castle has raised its dividend payment by an average of 8.3% per year over the last three years. Crown Castle has a payout ratio of 233.6% meaning the company cannot currently cover its dividend with earnings alone and is relying on its balance sheet to cover its dividend payments. Analysts expect Crown Castle to earn $6.51 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $6.26 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 96.2%.

Crown Castle Price Performance

NYSE:CCI opened at $119.96 on Wednesday. Crown Castle has a 12 month low of $84.72 and a 12 month high of $120.11. The firm has a market cap of $52.13 billion, a PE ratio of 37.49 and a beta of 0.85. The company has a quick ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 0.43 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 4.04. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $108.39 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $103.52.

Crown Castle (NYSE:CCI) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 17th. The real estate investment trust reported $0.58 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.54 by $0.04. The company had revenue of $1.63 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.62 billion. Crown Castle had a return on equity of 19.20% and a net margin of 17.98%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 12.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $2.05 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Crown Castle will post 6.64 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on CCI shares. Raymond James reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $126.00 target price (up previously from $124.00) on shares of Crown Castle in a research report on Friday, June 14th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price target on Crown Castle from $100.00 to $104.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 25th. Bank of America upped their price target on shares of Crown Castle from $110.00 to $115.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 13th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price target on shares of Crown Castle from $103.00 to $105.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 23rd. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group began coverage on shares of Crown Castle in a research note on Monday, July 1st. They issued a “neutral” rating and a $104.00 price objective on the stock. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Crown Castle presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $113.53.

Insider Activity

In other Crown Castle news, COO Michael Joseph Kavanagh sold 10,883 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $103.72, for a total transaction of $1,128,784.76. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 75,127 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $7,792,172.44. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Company insiders own 0.39% of the company’s stock.

About Crown Castle

Crown Castle owns, operates and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and approximately 90,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market. This nationwide portfolio of communications infrastructure connects cities and communities to essential data, technology and wireless service – bringing information, ideas and innovations to the people and businesses that need them.