Ashland Inc. (ASH) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.42 on March 15th

Ashland Inc. (NYSE:ASH) announced a quarterly dividend on Monday, January 19th. Investors of record on Sunday, March 1st will be paid a dividend of 0.415 per share by the basic materials company on Sunday, March 15th. This represents a c) annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.6%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 27th.

Ashland has increased its dividend payment by an average of 0.1%annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 16 years. Ashland has a dividend payout ratio of 34.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Ashland to earn $5.29 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $1.66 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 31.4%.

Ashland Stock Performance

Shares of Ashland stock opened at $64.10 on Wednesday. Ashland has a 12 month low of $45.21 and a 12 month high of $65.64. The company has a quick ratio of 1.61, a current ratio of 3.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.74. The stock has a market cap of $2.93 billion, a PE ratio of -4.24, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.06 and a beta of 0.43. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $61.61 and a 200-day simple moving average of $55.52.

Ashland (NYSE:ASH) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Monday, February 2nd. The basic materials company reported $0.26 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.23 by $0.03. Ashland had a positive return on equity of 7.58% and a negative net margin of 38.26%.The firm had revenue of $386.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $401.42 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.28 earnings per share. Ashland’s quarterly revenue was down 4.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that Ashland will post 4.27 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of research firms have issued reports on ASH. Evercore set a $62.00 target price on shares of Ashland in a research report on Wednesday, February 18th. Morgan Stanley set a $63.00 target price on Ashland in a research note on Monday, February 9th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price target on Ashland from $77.00 to $70.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, February 4th. Zacks Research upgraded Ashland from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, Argus lifted their target price on shares of Ashland from $65.00 to $70.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 12th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, four have issued a Hold rating and one has issued a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $67.67.

Ashland Company Profile

Ashland Inc is a global specialty chemicals company that develops, manufactures and supplies a broad range of performance and process-critical additives, ingredients and technologies. Its portfolio spans performance additives for coatings, adhesives and sealants; specialty ingredients for personal care and pharmaceutical applications; and process aids used in water treatment and other industrial processes. Ashland aims to address customer challenges by delivering tailored solutions that improve product performance, processing efficiency and sustainability outcomes.

Founded in 1924 as the Ashland Oil & Refining Company, the firm gradually expanded into the specialty chemicals sector over the second half of the 20th century.