Celanese Co. Declares Quarterly Dividend of $0.70 (NYSE:CE)

Celanese Co. (NYSE:CE) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, April 17th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Monday, April 29th will be paid a dividend of 0.70 per share by the basic materials company on Monday, May 13th. This represents a $2.80 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.80%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, April 26th.

Celanese has raised its dividend by an average of 4.1% annually over the last three years. Celanese has a dividend payout ratio of 20.1% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Celanese to earn $13.96 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.80 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 20.1%.

Celanese Stock Down 0.4 %

Shares of NYSE:CE opened at $155.45 on Thursday. Celanese has a 12-month low of $99.33 and a 12-month high of $172.16. The company has a current ratio of 1.53, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.63. The firm has a market cap of $16.93 billion, a PE ratio of 8.68, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.62 and a beta of 1.36. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $158.34 and a 200 day simple moving average of $144.68.

Celanese (NYSE:CE) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, February 20th. The basic materials company reported $2.24 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.29 by ($0.05). The company had revenue of $2.57 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.59 billion. Celanese had a return on equity of 14.61% and a net margin of 17.92%. Celanese’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.44 EPS. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Celanese will post 11.35 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insider Buying and Selling at Celanese

In related news, SVP Mark Christopher Murray acquired 597 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, March 8th. The shares were acquired at an average cost of $156.43 per share, for a total transaction of $93,388.71. Following the completion of the purchase, the senior vice president now directly owns 11,600 shares in the company, valued at $1,814,588. The acquisition was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. In related news, SVP Mark Christopher Murray acquired 597 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 8th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $156.43 per share, for a total transaction of $93,388.71. Following the completion of the acquisition, the senior vice president now directly owns 11,600 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,814,588. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, COO Scott A. Richardson sold 2,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, March 14th. The stock was sold at an average price of $156.85, for a total value of $313,700.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 76,429 shares in the company, valued at approximately $11,987,888.65. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.33% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have recently commented on CE. StockNews.com upgraded Celanese from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 21st. Piper Sandler upgraded shares of Celanese from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $135.00 to $170.00 in a research note on Monday, February 26th. Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co. downgraded shares of Celanese from a “buy” rating to a “sell” rating and set a $140.00 price target on the stock. in a research report on Thursday, February 22nd. KeyCorp boosted their price objective on shares of Celanese from $176.00 to $190.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 9th. Finally, UBS Group raised their target price on shares of Celanese from $169.00 to $170.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 11th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have given a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $149.56.

About Celanese

Celanese Corporation, a chemical and specialty materials company, manufactures and sells high performance engineered polymers in the United States and internationally. It operates through Engineered Materials and Acetyl Chain. The Engineered Materials segment develops, produces, and supplies specialty polymers for automotive and medical applications, as well as for use in industrial products and consumer electronics.