Stock Update (NYSE:KR): Kroger Board of Directors Declares Quarterly Dividend, Approves Incremental $500 Million Share Repurchase Program

[PR Newswire] – CINCINNATI, March 10, 2016 /PRNewswire/ — The Kroger Co.’s (KR) Board of Directors today declared a quarterly dividend of 10.5 cents per share to be paid on June 1, 2016, to shareholders of record on the close of business on May 13, 2016. Kroger has delivered double-digit compound growth in its dividend since it was reinstated in 2006. Kroger today also announced a new, $500 million share repurchase program, supplementing the current authorization, which has $175.6 million remaining as of March 9, 2016. Read more on this. The Kroger Co. (KR) , with a current market cap of $36.43B, started the session at $37.81. During today’s session, KR traded between $37.25 to $37.96 with its 52-week range being $27.32 to $42.75. KR shares are currently priced at 16.88x this year’s forecasted earnings, which makes them relatively inexpensive compared to the industry’s 22.26x forward p/e ratio. And for those looking to make a return holding the stock, the company pays shareholders $0.42 per share annually in dividends, yielding 1.14%. Consensus earnings for the current quarter by the 24 sell-side analysts covering the stock is an estimate of $0.69 per share, which would be $0.06 better than the year-ago quarter and a $0.01 sequential decrease. What we find to be interesting is that the full-year EPS estimate of $2.24 is a $0.18 better when compared to the previous year’s annual results. The quarterly earnings estimate is based on a consensus revenue forecast of the current quarter of $34.82 Billion. If realized, that would be a 5.36% increase over the year-ago quarter. More recently, Macquarie downgraded KR from Neutral to Underperform (Mar 4, 2016). Previously, Stifel Initiated KR at to Buy. With the above information in mind, readers should note that the average price target is $43.36, which is 14.68% above where the stock opened this morning. See more in (NYSE:KR) Similar Articles: Stock Update: MasterCard Inc (NYSE:MA) – MasterCard Board of Directors Announces Increase in Quarterly Dividend and $4 Billion Class A Share Repurchase Program Market Update: The Sherwin-Williams Company (NYSE:SHW) – Sherwin-Williams Declares Dividend of $0.67 per Common Share; Board Approves 10 Million Share Stock Repurchase Authorization Stock Update: The Kroger Co (NYSE:KR) – Kroger Board of Directors Declares Quarterly Dividend