Lakeland Financial Co. (LKFN) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.50 on February 5th

Lakeland Financial Co. (NASDAQ:LKFN) declared a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, January 15th,Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Saturday, January 25th will be given a dividend of 0.50 per share by the financial services provider on Wednesday, February 5th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.93%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 24th. This is an increase from Lakeland Financial’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.48.

Lakeland Financial has increased its dividend by an average of 12.2% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 13 consecutive years. Lakeland Financial has a payout ratio of 50.9% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Lakeland Financial to earn $3.55 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.92 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 54.1%.

Lakeland Financial Trading Down 0.6 %

LKFN opened at $68.15 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.74 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.70 and a beta of 0.69. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $71.45 and a 200-day moving average price of $67.31. Lakeland Financial has a 12-month low of $57.45 and a 12-month high of $78.61.

Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) last issued its earnings results on Friday, October 25th. The financial services provider reported $0.91 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.88 by $0.03. The business had revenue of $106.94 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $59.90 million. Lakeland Financial had a return on equity of 13.64% and a net margin of 22.85%. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.98 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts predict that Lakeland Financial will post 3.42 EPS for the current year.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, EVP Eric H. Ottinger sold 3,959 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $73.50, for a total value of $290,986.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 32,475 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,386,912.50. This represents a 10.87 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Insiders have sold a total of 4,150 shares of company stock worth $305,327 in the last 90 days. 3.30% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

About Lakeland Financial

Lakeland Financial Corporation operates as the bank holding company for Lake City Bank that provides various banking products and services in the United States. The company accepts various deposit products, such as noninterest bearing, interest-bearing checking, savings, money market, NOW, and demand deposits.