TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) Plans Quarterly Dividend of $0.04

TransAlta Co. (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) announced a quarterly dividend on Wednesday, October 23rd, Zacks reports. Stockholders of record on Sunday, December 1st will be paid a dividend of 0.044 per share by the utilities provider on Wednesday, January 1st. This represents a $0.18 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.73%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 29th.

TransAlta has increased its dividend by an average of 8.6% per year over the last three years. TransAlta has a dividend payout ratio of 51.4% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect TransAlta to earn $0.56 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.18 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 32.1%.

TransAlta Stock Up 0.1 %

TAC opened at $10.15 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $3.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 6.72 and a beta of 0.92. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.43, a quick ratio of 0.75 and a current ratio of 0.84. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $9.62 and its 200 day moving average is $7.98. TransAlta has a fifty-two week low of $5.94 and a fifty-two week high of $10.73.

TransAlta (NYSE:TAC) (TSE:TA) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 1st. The utilities provider reported $0.13 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.05 by $0.08. The business had revenue of $425.37 million for the quarter. TransAlta had a return on equity of 47.71% and a net margin of 18.41%. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $0.17 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that TransAlta will post 0.75 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, StockNews.com lowered shares of TransAlta from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, September 25th.

About TransAlta

TransAlta Corporation engages in the development, production, and sale of electric energy. It operates through Hydro, Wind and Solar, Gas, Energy Transition, and Energy Marketing segments. The Hydro segment holds interest of approximately 922 megawatts (MW) of owned hydroelectric generating capacity located in Alberta, British Columbia, and Ontario.