Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. Announces Quarterly Dividend of $0.48 (NASDAQ:WBA)

Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. (NASDAQ:WBA – Get Rating) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, April 28th, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 20th will be paid a dividend of 0.4775 per share by the pharmacy operator on Friday, June 10th. This represents a $1.91 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 4.25%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, May 19th.

Walgreens Boots Alliance has raised its dividend by an average of 4.0% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 46 consecutive years. Walgreens Boots Alliance has a dividend payout ratio of 39.2% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Walgreens Boots Alliance to earn $4.74 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.91 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 40.3%.

Shares of NASDAQ:WBA opened at $44.94 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36, a current ratio of 0.74 and a quick ratio of 0.35. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $45.34 and its 200-day moving average price is $47.90. The firm has a market capitalization of $38.82 billion, a PE ratio of 6.20, a P/E/G ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 0.55. Walgreens Boots Alliance has a 1 year low of $41.80 and a 1 year high of $55.96.

Walgreens Boots Alliance (NASDAQ:WBA – Get Rating) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, March 31st. The pharmacy operator reported $1.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.39 by $0.20. The company had revenue of $33.76 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $33.33 billion. Walgreens Boots Alliance had a return on equity of 19.15% and a net margin of 4.62%. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 3.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.40 earnings per share. As a group, analysts expect that Walgreens Boots Alliance will post 5.05 earnings per share for the current year.

In other news, major shareholder Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc. sold 6,000,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, May 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $150.00, for a total transaction of $900,000,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 52,854,867 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,928,230,050. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 17.40% of the company’s stock.

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its position in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 7.5% in the 1st quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 5,132,750 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $229,794,000 after purchasing an additional 358,403 shares during the period. Shapiro Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 9.7% in the first quarter. Shapiro Capital Management LLC now owns 3,489,368 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock valued at $156,219,000 after purchasing an additional 308,364 shares during the period. Parametric Portfolio Associates LLC raised its stake in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 3.4% during the fourth quarter. Parametric Portfolio Associates LLC now owns 2,828,498 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $147,534,000 after purchasing an additional 91,859 shares during the last quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 179.9% during the first quarter. Renaissance Technologies LLC now owns 1,910,000 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $85,511,000 after purchasing an additional 1,227,700 shares during the period. Finally, Edgar Lomax Co. VA lifted its holdings in shares of Walgreens Boots Alliance by 26.2% during the first quarter. Edgar Lomax Co. VA now owns 1,591,390 shares of the pharmacy operator’s stock worth $71,247,000 after purchasing an additional 330,080 shares during the period. 57.02% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

A number of research firms have commented on WBA. TheStreet downgraded Walgreens Boots Alliance from a “b-” rating to a “c+” rating in a research report on Monday, May 2nd. Robert W. Baird downgraded Walgreens Boots Alliance from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $70.00 to $51.00 in a research report on Friday, April 1st. UBS Group reduced their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $52.00 to $49.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, April 5th. Cowen reduced their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $55.00 to $50.00 in a research report on Tuesday, April 12th. Finally, Barclays reduced their target price on Walgreens Boots Alliance from $54.00 to $50.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, April 1st. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and one has assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $50.71.

Walgreens Boots Alliance Company Profile (Get Rating)

Walgreens Boots Alliance, Inc operates as a pharmacy-led health and beauty retail company. It operates through two segments, the United States and International. The United States segment sells prescription drugs and an assortment of retail products, including health, wellness, beauty, personal care, consumable, and general merchandise products through its retail drugstores.

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