Ventas, Inc. to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.45 (NYSE:VTR)

Ventas, Inc. (NYSE:VTR) announced a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, September 17th, Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Tuesday, October 1st will be given a dividend of 0.45 per share by the real estate investment trust on Thursday, October 17th. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.82%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, October 1st.

Ventas has decreased its dividend payment by an average of 5.6% per year over the last three years. Ventas has a payout ratio of 2,250.0% indicating that the company cannot currently cover its dividend with earnings alone and is relying on its balance sheet to cover its dividend payments. Equities research analysts expect Ventas to earn $3.35 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.80 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 53.7%.

Ventas Price Performance

Shares of VTR stock opened at $63.84 on Monday. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $60.01 and a 200 day simple moving average of $51.78. The company has a market cap of $25.84 billion, a P/E ratio of -336.00, a P/E/G ratio of 2.83 and a beta of 1.36. The company has a quick ratio of 0.58, a current ratio of 0.58 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.36. Ventas has a twelve month low of $39.33 and a twelve month high of $65.64.

Ventas (NYSE:VTR) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, August 1st. The real estate investment trust reported $0.05 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.79 by ($0.74). The company had revenue of $1.20 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.19 billion. Ventas had a negative return on equity of 1.63% and a negative net margin of 3.33%. The firm’s revenue was up 8.6% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $0.75 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that Ventas will post 3.18 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Ventas news, CEO Debra A. Cafaro sold 40,079 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.29, for a total transaction of $2,296,125.91. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 986,717 shares in the company, valued at approximately $56,529,016.93. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. In related news, CEO Debra A. Cafaro sold 40,079 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 6th. The stock was sold at an average price of $57.29, for a total transaction of $2,296,125.91. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 986,717 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $56,529,016.93. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CFO Robert F. Probst sold 20,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, August 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $58.87, for a total value of $1,177,400.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 156,403 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,207,444.61. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 77,065 shares of company stock worth $4,526,464. Company insiders own 1.00% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on the company. Wedbush boosted their price objective on Ventas from $64.00 to $71.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Tuesday, September 10th. Royal Bank of Canada upped their price objective on Ventas from $52.00 to $63.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, August 9th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Ventas from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 10th. Evercore ISI upped their price target on shares of Ventas from $64.00 to $70.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, September 16th. Finally, Wolfe Research upgraded shares of Ventas to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, August 9th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Ventas presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $58.67.

About Ventas

Ventas Inc (NYSE: VTR) is a leading S&P 500 real estate investment trust focused on delivering strong, sustainable shareholder returns by enabling exceptional environments that benefit a large and growing aging population. The Company's growth is fueled by its senior housing communities, which provide valuable services to residents and enable them to thrive in supported environments.