Peoples Financial Services (NASDAQ:PFIS) Hits New 1-Year High – Still a Buy?

Peoples Financial Services Corp. (NASDAQ:PFIS) hit a new 52-week high on Friday . The company traded as high as $56.00 and last traded at $56.00, with a volume of 3844 shares traded. The stock had previously closed at $54.85.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have commented on PFIS shares. Hovde Group increased their target price on Peoples Financial Services from $48.00 to $53.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Monday, November 11th. StockNews.com raised Peoples Financial Services from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, November 7th.

Peoples Financial Services Trading Up 1.7 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 0.93 and a quick ratio of 0.93. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $48.20 and its two-hundred day moving average is $44.92. The company has a market cap of $557.52 million, a P/E ratio of 53.25 and a beta of 0.50.

Peoples Financial Services (NASDAQ:PFIS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, November 5th. The financial services provider reported $1.64 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.08 by $0.56. Peoples Financial Services had a return on equity of 7.73% and a net margin of 3.00%. The firm had revenue of $74.01 million for the quarter. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Peoples Financial Services Corp. will post 3.43 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Peoples Financial Services Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 13th. Investors of record on Friday, November 29th will be issued a $0.618 dividend. This represents a $2.47 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.43%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 29th. Peoples Financial Services’s payout ratio is currently 239.81%.

Institutional Trading of Peoples Financial Services

Large investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Empowered Funds LLC grew its holdings in shares of Peoples Financial Services by 58.6% in the third quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 45,345 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $2,126,000 after acquiring an additional 16,753 shares during the period. Quadrature Capital Ltd grew its holdings in shares of Peoples Financial Services by 46.7% in the first quarter. Quadrature Capital Ltd now owns 10,707 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $460,000 after acquiring an additional 3,409 shares during the period. BNP Paribas Financial Markets grew its holdings in shares of Peoples Financial Services by 87.7% in the first quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 3,400 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $147,000 after acquiring an additional 1,589 shares during the period. Alliance Wealth Advisors LLC grew its holdings in shares of Peoples Financial Services by 413.0% in the third quarter. Alliance Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 38,632 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,811,000 after acquiring an additional 31,102 shares during the period. Finally, SG Americas Securities LLC bought a new stake in shares of Peoples Financial Services in the third quarter worth $149,000. Institutional investors own 31.67% of the company’s stock.

Peoples Financial Services Company Profile

Peoples Financial Services Corp. operates as the bank holding company for Peoples Security Bank and Trust Company that provides various commercial and retail banking services. The company accepts money market, negotiable order of withdrawal, savings, individual retirement, demand deposit, and certificates of deposit accounts.