BCE (TSE:BCE) Upgraded at BMO Capital Markets

BMO Capital Markets upgraded shares of BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) from a market perform rating to an outperform rating in a research note published on Thursday, MarketBeat.com reports. They currently have C$37.00 price target on the stock.

BCE has been the subject of several other research reports. Desjardins boosted their target price on shares of BCE from C$41.00 to C$42.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 7th. TD Securities cut their price objective on BCE from C$39.00 to C$38.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, November 7th. Cibc Captl Mkts upgraded BCE from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, December 9th. Scotiabank upped their price target on BCE from C$39.50 to C$41.50 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, September 8th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada upgraded BCE from a “sector perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from C$35.00 to C$47.00 in a research note on Wednesday, October 15th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have given a Buy rating, three have given a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of C$36.41.

BCE Stock Performance

Shares of BCE opened at C$32.62 on Thursday. The stock has a market capitalization of C$30.42 billion, a P/E ratio of 4.90, a P/E/G ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.51. BCE has a 1 year low of C$28.73 and a 1 year high of C$36.80. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 226.73, a quick ratio of 0.43 and a current ratio of 0.62. The company’s fifty day moving average is C$32.62 and its two-hundred day moving average is C$32.45.

BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, November 6th. The company reported C$0.79 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter. BCE had a return on equity of 1.39% and a net margin of 1.10%.The company had revenue of C$6.05 billion for the quarter. On average, sell-side analysts predict that BCE will post 3.1120864 earnings per share for the current year.

BCE Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, January 15th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, January 15th will be given a dividend of $0.4375 per share. This represents a $1.75 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 5.4%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, December 15th. BCE’s dividend payout ratio is 43.09%.

About BCE

BCE is both a wireless and internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada. It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its roughly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrierthe legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provincesOntario and Quebec.