Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) Issues Earnings Results, Beats Estimates By $0.05 EPS

Lakeland Financial (NASDAQ:LKFN) released its quarterly earnings data on Friday. The financial services provider reported $0.94 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.89 by $0.05, Zacks reports. Lakeland Financial had a net margin of 22.85% and a return on equity of 13.64%.

Lakeland Financial Stock Performance

NASDAQ:LKFN opened at $65.97 on Friday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $70.94 and its 200-day moving average is $67.58. Lakeland Financial has a 52 week low of $57.45 and a 52 week high of $78.61. The firm has a market cap of $1.68 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.06 and a beta of 0.69.

Lakeland Financial Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, February 5th. Shareholders of record on Saturday, January 25th will be given a $0.50 dividend. This is a boost from Lakeland Financial’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.48. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.03%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 24th. Lakeland Financial’s dividend payout ratio is 51.95%.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Eric H. Ottinger sold 3,959 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $73.50, for a total value of $290,986.50. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 32,475 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,386,912.50. This represents a 10.87 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In the last three months, insiders have sold 4,150 shares of company stock valued at $305,327. 3.30% of the stock is currently owned by 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.