BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE) Receives Average Rating of “Hold” from Analysts

BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) has earned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the ten ratings firms that are covering the company, MarketBeat reports. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and three have given a buy recommendation to the company. The average 1-year price target among brokers that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is C$52.00.

Several research firms have recently commented on BCE. TD Securities cut their price target on BCE from C$48.00 to C$47.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, May 3rd. Cormark cut their price target on BCE from C$58.00 to C$53.00 in a research note on Thursday, April 18th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price objective on BCE from C$46.00 to C$47.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, June 12th. CIBC upgraded BCE from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 23rd. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada cut their price objective on BCE from C$57.00 to C$54.00 and set a “sector perform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th.

BCE Price Performance

BCE stock opened at C$44.31 on Monday. BCE has a 12 month low of C$43.96 and a 12 month high of C$60.60. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 184.91, a current ratio of 0.61 and a quick ratio of 0.43. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of C$45.86 and a 200-day simple moving average of C$48.73. The stock has a market capitalization of C$40.42 billion, a PE ratio of 23.08, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.90 and a beta of 0.44.

BCE (TSE:BCE) (NYSE:BCE) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The company reported C$0.72 EPS for the quarter, hitting the consensus estimate of C$0.72. BCE had a return on equity of 9.36% and a net margin of 7.88%. The business had revenue of C$6.01 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of C$6.09 billion. Equities analysts predict that BCE will post 3.0157895 earnings per share for the current year.

BCE Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, July 15th. Shareholders of record on Monday, July 15th will be issued a $0.998 dividend. This represents a $3.99 annualized dividend and a yield of 9.01%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, June 14th. BCE’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 207.81%.

About BCE

BCE Inc, a communications company, provides wireless, wireline, Internet, and television (TV) services to residential, business, and wholesale customers in Canada. The company operates through two segments, Bell Communication and Technology Services, and Bell Media. The Bell Communication and Technology Services segment provides wireless products and services including mobile data and voice plans and devices; wireline products and services comprising data, including internet access, internet protocol television, cloud-based services, and business solutions, as well as voice, and other communication services and products; and satellite TV and connectivity services for residential, small and medium-sized business, government, and large enterprise customers.