First Busey Co. Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.24 (NASDAQ:BUSE)

First Busey Co. (NASDAQ:BUSE) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, October 8th, Zacks reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, October 18th will be given a dividend of 0.24 per share by the bank on Friday, October 25th. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.69%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, October 18th.

First Busey has increased its dividend payment by an average of 2.9% annually over the last three years. First Busey has a dividend payout ratio of 41.9% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect First Busey to earn $2.57 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.96 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 37.4%.

First Busey Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:BUSE opened at $26.03 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.81, a current ratio of 0.81 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $25.89 and a 200 day simple moving average of $24.52. First Busey has a fifty-two week low of $17.51 and a fifty-two week high of $28.97. The company has a market cap of $1.48 billion, a PE ratio of 13.15 and a beta of 0.84.

First Busey (NASDAQ:BUSE) last posted its earnings results on Tuesday, July 23rd. The bank reported $0.50 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.49 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $116.24 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $116.65 million. First Busey had a return on equity of 9.10% and a net margin of 17.18%. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that First Busey will post 2.05 EPS for the current year.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

BUSE has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Stephens cut First Busey from an “overweight” rating to an “equal weight” rating and cut their target price for the company from $28.00 to $27.00 in a research note on Monday. StockNews.com upgraded shares of First Busey from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, September 12th. DA Davidson upped their target price on shares of First Busey from $28.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 28th. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods raised their price target on shares of First Busey from $31.00 to $33.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 28th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $27.80.

First Busey Company Profile

First Busey Corporation operates as the bank holding company for Busey Bank that engages in the provision of retail and commercial banking products and services to individual, corporate, institutional, and governmental customers in the United States. It operates through three segments: Banking, Wealth Management, and FirsTech.