Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR) Announces $0.23 Quarterly Dividend

Pentair plc (NYSE:PNR) declared a quarterly dividend on Monday, February 19th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 19th will be paid a dividend of 0.23 per share by the industrial products company on Friday, May 3rd. This represents a $0.92 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.15%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, April 18th.

Pentair has raised its dividend by an average of 5.0% annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 6 consecutive years. Pentair has a payout ratio of 19.4% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect Pentair to earn $4.74 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.92 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 19.4%.

Pentair Price Performance

NYSE:PNR opened at $80.03 on Wednesday. Pentair has a 52-week low of $51.38 and a 52-week high of $85.81. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $79.76 and a 200 day moving average of $71.24. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.62, a quick ratio of 0.94 and a current ratio of 1.65. The firm has a market capitalization of $13.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.34, a P/E/G ratio of 1.53 and a beta of 1.20.

Pentair (NYSE:PNR) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, January 30th. The industrial products company reported $0.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.86 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $984.60 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $975.36 million. Pentair had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 15.17%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 1.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.82 EPS. On average, research analysts expect that Pentair will post 4.21 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

PNR has been the topic of several research reports. BNP Paribas began coverage on shares of Pentair in a research report on Tuesday, March 12th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $86.00 price objective on the stock. The Goldman Sachs Group reiterated a “neutral” rating and issued a $91.00 price objective on shares of Pentair in a report on Friday, March 22nd. Bank of America raised Pentair from an “underperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $46.00 to $76.00 in a report on Thursday, January 11th. UBS Group upped their target price on Pentair from $72.00 to $83.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, January 10th. Finally, StockNews.com downgraded shares of Pentair from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, February 2nd. Five equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Pentair presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $87.33.

Institutional Trading of Pentair

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its position in Pentair by 1.0% during the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 19,246,330 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $781,978,000 after purchasing an additional 186,726 shares during the period. BlackRock Inc. increased its position in shares of Pentair by 10.6% during the first quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 15,999,717 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $884,304,000 after buying an additional 1,526,893 shares during the period. State Street Corp raised its stake in Pentair by 4.4% in the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 10,611,971 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $431,164,000 after buying an additional 443,034 shares in the last quarter. Invesco Ltd. lifted its holdings in Pentair by 8.2% in the first quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 6,346,517 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $344,045,000 after buying an additional 479,701 shares during the period. Finally, Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in Pentair by 2.4% during the 1st quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,522,665 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $194,269,000 after acquiring an additional 83,740 shares in the last quarter. 92.37% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Pentair Company Profile

Pentair plc provides various water solutions in the United States, Western Europe, China, Eastern Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia, Canada, and Japan. The company operates through three segments: Flow, Water Solutions, and Pool. The Flow segment designs, manufactures, and sells fluid treatment and pump products and systems, including pressure vessels, gas recovery solutions, membrane bioreactors, wastewater reuse systems and advanced membrane filtration, separation systems, water disposal pumps, water supply pumps, fluid transfer pumps, turbine pumps, solid handling pumps, and agricultural spray nozzles for fluid delivery, ion exchange, desalination, food and beverage, separation technologies in the oil and gas industry, residential and municipal wells, water treatment, wastewater solids handling, pressure boosting, circulation and transfer, fire suppression, flood control, agricultural irrigation, and crop spray in residential, commercial, and industrial markets.