General Mills, Inc. (NYSE:GIS) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $0.60

General Mills, Inc. (NYSE:GIS) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, January 28th,RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Thursday, April 10th will be paid a dividend of 0.60 per share on Thursday, May 1st. This represents a $2.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 3.89%.

General Mills has raised its dividend payment by an average of 5.3% annually over the last three years. General Mills has a dividend payout ratio of 49.8% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect General Mills to earn $4.59 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.40 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 52.3%.

General Mills Stock Up 2.1 %

GIS stock opened at $61.63 on Tuesday. The firm’s 50-day moving average is $63.31 and its two-hundred day moving average is $67.45. The company has a market capitalization of $33.97 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.70 and a beta of 0.11. General Mills has a 52 week low of $57.94 and a 52 week high of $75.90. The company has a current ratio of 0.92, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.32.

General Mills (NYSE:GIS) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, December 18th. The company reported $1.40 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.22 by $0.18. General Mills had a return on equity of 27.55% and a net margin of 13.08%. The company had revenue of $5.24 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $5.14 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.25 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 2.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts forecast that General Mills will post 4.42 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have commented on GIS shares. Bank of America raised shares of General Mills from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $78.00 to $80.00 in a research note on Friday, December 13th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their price target on General Mills from $83.00 to $82.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Stifel Nicolaus decreased their price objective on shares of General Mills from $78.00 to $72.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Friday. Citigroup dropped their price target on shares of General Mills from $71.00 to $67.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, December 19th. Finally, Barclays cut their price objective on General Mills from $74.00 to $68.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, December 20th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, twelve have given a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, General Mills has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $70.94.

Insider Buying and Selling at General Mills

In other news, insider Paul Joseph Gallagher sold 1,041 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, December 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $64.50, for a total transaction of $67,144.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 42,117 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,716,546.50. This represents a 2.41 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, Director Maria Sastre sold 1,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $63.66, for a total transaction of $63,660.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 23,013 shares in the company, valued at $1,465,007.58. This represents a 4.16 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 0.26% of the company’s stock.

General Mills Company Profile

General Mills, Inc manufactures and markets branded consumer foods worldwide. The company operates through four segments: North America Retail; International; Pet; and North America Foodservice. It offers grain, ready-to-eat cereals, refrigerated yogurt, soup, meal kits, refrigerated and frozen dough products, dessert and baking mixes, bakery flour, frozen pizza and pizza snacks, snack bars, fruit and savory snacks, ice cream and frozen desserts, unbaked and fully baked frozen dough products, frozen hot snacks, ethnic meals, side dish mixes, frozen breakfast and entrees, nutrition bars, and frozen and shelf-stable vegetables.