Smurfit Westrock Ltd (NYSE:SW) to Issue Dividend Increase – $0.43 Per Share

Smurfit Westrock Ltd (NYSE:SW) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, January 30th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Friday, February 14th will be given a dividend of 0.4308 per share on Tuesday, March 18th. This represents a $1.72 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.25%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 14th. This is an increase from Smurfit Westrock’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.30.

Smurfit Westrock Price Performance

Shares of SW opened at $53.00 on Friday. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $53.88 and a 200 day moving average price of $49.22. The stock has a market cap of $27.57 billion, a PE ratio of 294.46 and a beta of 1.03. Smurfit Westrock has a 1-year low of $38.55 and a 1-year high of $56.99. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.73, a current ratio of 1.48 and a quick ratio of 0.98.

Smurfit Westrock (NYSE:SW) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The company reported $0.48 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.71 by ($0.23). Smurfit Westrock had a positive return on equity of 5.98% and a negative net margin of 0.12%. The business had revenue of $7.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.04 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.81 EPS. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Smurfit Westrock will post 2.65 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Smurfit Westrock

In other Smurfit Westrock news, insider Saverio Mayer sold 25,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $54.84, for a total transaction of $1,371,000.00. Following the sale, the insider now owns 149,911 shares in the company, valued at $8,221,119.24. This represents a 14.29 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Corporate insiders own 0.49% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have commented on the stock. Truist Financial began coverage on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. They set a “buy” rating and a $62.00 target price on the stock. Citigroup lifted their target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $61.00 to $62.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 6th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on shares of Smurfit Westrock from $65.00 to $69.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, November 29th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on Smurfit Westrock from $53.00 to $50.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, October 7th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $58.00 target price on shares of Smurfit Westrock in a research note on Friday, November 15th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $60.70.

Smurfit Westrock Company Profile

Smurfit Westrock Plc, together with its subsidiaries, manufactures, distributes, and sells containerboard, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products in Ireland and internationally. The company produces containerboard that it converts into corrugated containers or sells to third parties, as well as produces other types of paper, such as consumer packaging board, sack paper, graphic paper, solid board and graphic board, and other paper-based packaging products, such as consumer packaging, solid board packaging, paper sacks, and other packaging products, including bag-in-box.