Dime Community Bancshares (NASDAQ:DCOM) Posts Earnings Results, Misses Estimates By $0.02 EPS

Dime Community Bancshares (NASDAQ:DCOM) released its earnings results on Thursday. The savings and loans company reported $0.42 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.44 by ($0.02), Zacks reports. Dime Community Bancshares had a net margin of 9.65% and a return on equity of 5.58%.

Dime Community Bancshares Stock Down 2.4 %

Shares of NASDAQ:DCOM opened at $31.00 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $1.21 billion, a PE ratio of 20.67 and a beta of 1.05. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a current ratio of 1.01. The company’s fifty day moving average is $33.16 and its 200-day moving average is $28.87. Dime Community Bancshares has a 52 week low of $17.29 and a 52 week high of $37.60.

Dime Community Bancshares Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 17th will be issued a dividend of $0.25 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 17th. This represents a $1.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.23%. Dime Community Bancshares’s payout ratio is presently 66.67%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CTO Michael Fegan sold 2,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $35.76, for a total transaction of $71,520.00. Following the sale, the chief technology officer now owns 20,155 shares in the company, valued at approximately $720,742.80. This represents a 9.03 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Basswood Capital Management, L purchased 29,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 12th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $32.00 per share, with a total value of $928,000.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now directly owns 1,044,221 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $33,415,072. The trade was a 2.86 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. 9.10% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have commented on DCOM shares. Raymond James raised their price objective on Dime Community Bancshares from $35.00 to $36.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Stephens upgraded shares of Dime Community Bancshares from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from $30.00 to $39.00 in a research note on Monday, November 18th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price target on shares of Dime Community Bancshares from $38.00 to $42.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 4th. Finally, Piper Sandler raised shares of Dime Community Bancshares from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $36.00 to $38.00 in a report on Thursday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $36.60.

Dime Community Bancshares Company Profile

Dime Community Bancshares, Inc operates as the holding company for Dime Community Bank that engages in the provision of various commercial banking and financial services. The company accepts time, savings, and demand deposits from the businesses, consumers, and local municipalities. It also offers commercial real estate loans; multi-family mortgage loans; residential mortgage loans; letters of credit; secured and unsecured commercial and consumer loans; lines of credit; home equity loans; and construction and land loans.