Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX) Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.08

Cognex Co. (NASDAQ:CGNX) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, February 12th,RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Thursday, February 27th will be paid a dividend of 0.08 per share by the scientific and technical instruments company on Thursday, March 13th. This represents a $0.32 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.82%.

Cognex has raised its dividend payment by an average of 7.6% per year over the last three years. Cognex has a dividend payout ratio of 24.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect Cognex to earn $0.64 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.32 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 50.0%.

Cognex Trading Down 0.9 %

Shares of NASDAQ:CGNX traded down $0.37 on Wednesday, reaching $39.25. 1,730,015 shares of the company traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,123,295. Cognex has a 52 week low of $34.98 and a 52 week high of $53.13. The business’s 50-day simple moving average is $37.94 and its 200 day simple moving average is $39.29. The stock has a market capitalization of $6.73 billion, a P/E ratio of 75.48 and a beta of 1.40.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on CGNX shares. Truist Financial upped their price target on shares of Cognex from $42.00 to $43.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, January 16th. Cantor Fitzgerald upgraded shares of Cognex to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, December 20th. Stephens reiterated an “overweight” rating and issued a $55.00 price target on shares of Cognex in a research note on Thursday, January 2nd. Needham & Company LLC dropped their target price on Cognex from $50.00 to $47.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, November 1st. Finally, Citigroup reduced their target price on shares of Cognex from $44.00 to $42.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, January 13th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating, six have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $47.92.

Insider Activity at Cognex

In other news, CTO Joerg Kuechen sold 2,934 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $37.75, for a total transaction of $110,758.50. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Director Anthony Sun sold 26,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, November 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $40.03, for a total value of $1,040,780.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 26,608 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,065,118.24. The trade was a 49.42 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 1.10% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

About Cognex

Cognex Corporation provides machine vision products that capture and analyze visual information to automate manufacturing and distribution tasks worldwide. Its machine vision products are used to automate the manufacturing and tracking of discrete items, including mobile phones, electric vehicle batteries, and e-commerce packages by locating, identifying, inspecting, and measuring them during the manufacturing or distribution process.