The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) Declares $3.00 Quarterly Dividend

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, January 16th,Wall Street Journal reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 28th will be paid a dividend of 3.00 per share by the investment management company on Friday, March 28th. This represents a $12.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.96%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 28th.

The Goldman Sachs Group has raised its dividend by an average of 21.0% annually over the last three years and has increased its dividend annually for the last 13 consecutive years. The Goldman Sachs Group has a dividend payout ratio of 24.2% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect The Goldman Sachs Group to earn $43.39 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $12.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 27.7%.

The Goldman Sachs Group Trading Up 1.0 %

Shares of The Goldman Sachs Group stock opened at $612.17 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $192.17 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.96, a P/E/G ratio of 0.66 and a beta of 1.38. The Goldman Sachs Group has a 52-week low of $372.07 and a 52-week high of $616.84. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.32, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a current ratio of 0.67. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $585.87 and its 200 day simple moving average is $528.13.

The Goldman Sachs Group (NYSE:GS) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 15th. The investment management company reported $11.95 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $8.21 by $3.74. The company had revenue of $13.87 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $12.36 billion. The Goldman Sachs Group had a net margin of 9.89% and a return on equity of 11.39%. The Goldman Sachs Group’s revenue was up 22.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $5.48 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that The Goldman Sachs Group will post 37.24 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other The Goldman Sachs Group news, Director David A. Viniar sold 5,000 shares of The Goldman Sachs Group stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $612.08, for a total transaction of $3,060,400.00. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 608,425 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $372,404,774. This trade represents a 0.82 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Sheara J. Fredman sold 2,974 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, November 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $594.51, for a total transaction of $1,768,072.74. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 8,489 shares in the company, valued at approximately $5,046,795.39. This represents a 25.94 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 20,940 shares of company stock valued at $12,656,179 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.57% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

GS has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. JMP Securities raised their price target on The Goldman Sachs Group from $525.00 to $550.00 and gave the stock a “market outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 9th. Oppenheimer cut their target price on The Goldman Sachs Group from $677.00 to $639.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. UBS Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and set a $610.00 price target on shares of The Goldman Sachs Group in a research report on Monday, January 6th. Citigroup increased their price target on shares of The Goldman Sachs Group from $485.00 to $585.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, November 21st. Finally, Barclays increased their target price on shares of The Goldman Sachs Group from $713.00 to $760.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, The Goldman Sachs Group currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $589.19.

About The Goldman Sachs Group

The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc, a financial institution, provides a range of financial services for corporations, financial institutions, governments, and individuals worldwide. It operates through Global Banking & Markets, Asset & Wealth Management, and Platform Solutions segments. The Global Banking & Markets segment provides financial advisory services, including strategic advisory assignments related to mergers and acquisitions, divestitures, corporate defense activities, restructurings, and spin-offs; and relationship lending, and acquisition financing, as well as secured lending, through structured credit and asset-backed lending and involved in financing under securities to resale agreements.