Lakeland Financial Co. (NASDAQ:LKFN) Plans Quarterly Dividend of $0.50

Lakeland Financial Co. (NASDAQ:LKFN) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, January 15th,Wall Street Journal reports. Shareholders of record on Saturday, January 25th will be given a dividend of 0.50 per share by the financial services provider on Wednesday, February 5th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.92%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 24th. This is a boost from Lakeland Financial’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.48.

Lakeland Financial has increased its dividend by an average of 12.2% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 13 consecutive years. Lakeland Financial has a dividend payout ratio of 50.9% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Lakeland Financial to earn $3.55 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.92 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 54.1%.

Lakeland Financial Price Performance

Shares of LKFN stock opened at $68.59 on Thursday. The company has a market capitalization of $1.75 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 17.82 and a beta of 0.69. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $71.52 and its 200-day moving average price is $67.31. Lakeland Financial has a one year low of $57.45 and a one year high of $78.61.

Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, October 25th. The financial services provider reported $0.91 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.88 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $106.94 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $59.90 million. Lakeland Financial had a return on equity of 13.64% and a net margin of 22.85%. During the same period last year, the firm earned $0.98 earnings per share. Equities research analysts expect that Lakeland Financial will post 3.42 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, EVP Eric H. Ottinger sold 3,959 shares of Lakeland Financial stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $73.50, for a total transaction of $290,986.50. Following the sale, the executive vice president now owns 32,475 shares in the company, valued at $2,386,912.50. This trade represents a 10.87 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In the last three months, insiders have sold 4,150 shares of company stock valued at $305,327. Corporate insiders own 3.30% of the company’s stock.

About Lakeland Financial

Lakeland Financial Corporation operates as the bank holding company for Lake City Bank that provides various banking products and services in the United States. The company accepts various deposit products, such as noninterest bearing, interest-bearing checking, savings, money market, NOW, and demand deposits.