Dime Community Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:DCOM) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.25

Dime Community Bancshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:DCOM) announced a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, December 17th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Friday, January 17th will be given a dividend of 0.25 per share by the savings and loans company on Friday, January 24th. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.94%.

Dime Community Bancshares has increased its dividend payment by an average of 1.0% per year over the last three years. Dime Community Bancshares has a payout ratio of 36.1% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect Dime Community Bancshares to earn $2.78 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 36.0%.

Dime Community Bancshares Trading Down 2.4 %

NASDAQ:DCOM opened at $33.96 on Wednesday. Dime Community Bancshares has a 12-month low of $17.29 and a 12-month high of $37.60. The firm has a market cap of $1.33 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.64 and a beta of 1.03. The company has a current ratio of 1.01, a quick ratio of 1.01 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.68. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $33.01 and its 200-day simple moving average is $26.68.

Dime Community Bancshares (NASDAQ:DCOM) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 22nd. The savings and loans company reported $0.29 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.41 by ($0.12). Dime Community Bancshares had a net margin of 9.65% and a return on equity of 5.58%. The firm had revenue of $171.87 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $86.65 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $0.56 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that Dime Community Bancshares will post 1.49 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In related news, CTO Michael Fegan sold 2,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $35.76, for a total transaction of $71,520.00. Following the transaction, the chief technology officer now owns 20,155 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $720,742.80. This represents a 9.03 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, Director Basswood Capital Management, L acquired 29,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, November 12th. The shares were acquired at an average price of $32.00 per share, for a total transaction of $928,000.00. Following the acquisition, the director now directly owns 1,044,221 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $33,415,072. The trade was a 2.86 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Company insiders own 9.10% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

DCOM has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Stephens raised Dime Community Bancshares from an “equal weight” rating to an “overweight” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $30.00 to $39.00 in a report on Monday, November 18th. Raymond James increased their price target on shares of Dime Community Bancshares from $35.00 to $36.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Dime Community Bancshares from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Saturday, September 21st. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods increased their target price on shares of Dime Community Bancshares from $38.00 to $42.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 4th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, one has issued a hold rating, three have assigned a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $34.20.

About Dime Community Bancshares

Dime Community Bancshares, Inc operates as the holding company for Dime Community Bank that engages in the provision of various commercial banking and financial services. The company accepts time, savings, and demand deposits from the businesses, consumers, and local municipalities. It also offers commercial real estate loans; multi-family mortgage loans; residential mortgage loans; letters of credit; secured and unsecured commercial and consumer loans; lines of credit; home equity loans; and construction and land loans.