Empire Company Limited (TSE:EMP.A) Given Consensus Rating of “Hold” by Analysts

Empire Company Limited (TSE:EMP.A) has earned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the six research firms that are currently covering the firm, Marketbeat reports. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and two have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 12-month target price among analysts that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is C$52.83.

Several research analysts recently weighed in on EMP.A shares. Royal Bank Of Canada reduced their price target on Empire from C$61.00 to C$55.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, January 23rd. Scotiabank cut Empire from an “outperform” rating to a “sector perform” rating and set a C$52.00 price target for the company. in a research report on Thursday, April 9th.

Empire Trading Down 2.1%

Empire stock opened at C$46.95 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.29, a current ratio of 0.79 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 135.51. Empire has a 52 week low of C$43.81 and a 52 week high of C$58.32. The company has a market capitalization of C$10.64 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 70.07, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 16.20 and a beta of -0.04. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of C$49.00 and a 200 day moving average price of C$48.57.

Empire (TSE:EMP.A) last released its earnings results on Thursday, March 12th. The company reported C$0.72 EPS for the quarter. The firm had revenue of C$7.89 billion during the quarter. Empire had a return on equity of 12.94% and a net margin of 2.18%. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Empire will post 2.9581227 EPS for the current year.

Empire Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, April 30th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 30th will be given a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.9%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, April 15th. Empire’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 128.36%.

About Empire

Empire Co Ltd key businesses are food retailing, investments, and other operations. The food retailing division operates through Empire’s subsidiary Sobeys and represents nearly all of the company’s income. This segment owns, affiliates, or franchises more than 1,500 stores in 10 provinces, under retail banners including Sobeys, Safeway, IGA, Foodland, FreshCo, Thrifty Foods, Lawton’s Drug Stores, and multiple retail fuel locations. The company’s investment and other operations segment include the investment in Crombie REIT, which is an open-ended Canadian real estate investment trust, as well as the Genstar Development Partnership.