First Foundation Inc. (NASDAQ:FFWM) to Issue $0.01 Quarterly Dividend

First Foundation Inc. (NASDAQ:FFWM) announced a quarterly dividend on Friday, April 26th, Wall Street Journal reports. Investors of record on Monday, May 6th will be given a dividend of 0.01 per share by the bank on Thursday, May 16th. This represents a $0.04 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.66%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 3rd.

First Foundation has a payout ratio of 3.8% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect First Foundation to earn $1.03 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.04 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 3.9%.

First Foundation Stock Performance

FFWM traded down $0.62 during trading on Friday, reaching $6.08. 608,647 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 596,264. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $7.38 and its 200-day simple moving average is $7.48. The stock has a market capitalization of $343.58 million, a P/E ratio of -1.82 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.52, a current ratio of 1.05 and a quick ratio of 1.05. First Foundation has a 1 year low of $3.69 and a 1 year high of $11.47.

First Foundation (NASDAQ:FFWM) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, January 25th. The bank reported $0.05 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.02 by $0.03. First Foundation had a positive return on equity of 1.80% and a negative net margin of 31.95%. The firm had revenue of $56.37 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $62.03 million. As a group, research analysts predict that First Foundation will post 0.29 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on FFWM shares. Raymond James raised shares of First Foundation from an “outperform” rating to a “strong-buy” rating and raised their price objective for the stock from $9.50 to $12.00 in a research note on Friday, January 5th. Wedbush cut their price objective on shares of First Foundation from $8.00 to $7.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Friday.

Insider Activity

In other First Foundation news, Chairman Ulrich E. Keller, Jr. sold 25,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $8.16, for a total transaction of $204,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chairman now directly owns 1,230,622 shares in the company, valued at $10,041,875.52. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 10.20% of the company’s stock.

First Foundation Company Profile

First Foundation Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides banking services, investment advisory, wealth management, and trust services to individuals, businesses, and other organizations in the United States. The company operates in two segments, Banking and Wealth Management. It offers a range of deposit products, including personal and business checking accounts, savings accounts, interest-bearing demand deposit accounts, money market accounts, and time certificate of deposits; and loan products consisting of multifamily and single family residential real estate loans, commercial real estate loans, commercial term loans, and line of credits, as well as consumer loans, such as personal installment loans and line of credits, and home equity line of credits.