MetLife, Inc. (MET) To Go Ex-Dividend on November 4th

MetLife, Inc. (NYSE:MET) declared a quarterly dividend on Tuesday, October 7th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, November 4th will be given a dividend of 0.5675 per share by the financial services provider on Tuesday, December 9th. This represents a c) annualized dividend and a yield of 2.8%. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, November 4th.

MetLife has increased its dividend by an average of 0.0%annually over the last three years and has raised its dividend every year for the last 12 years. MetLife has a payout ratio of 22.0% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect MetLife to earn $10.57 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.27 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 21.5%.

MetLife Price Performance

Shares of MET opened at $79.85 on Friday. MetLife has a fifty-two week low of $65.21 and a fifty-two week high of $89.05. The company has a market capitalization of $53.10 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 13.53, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.70 and a beta of 0.86. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $80.35 and a 200-day simple moving average of $78.63. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.57, a quick ratio of 0.16 and a current ratio of 0.16.

MetLife (NYSE:MET) last announced its earnings results on Wednesday, August 6th. The financial services provider reported $2.02 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $2.32 by ($0.30). MetLife had a return on equity of 19.88% and a net margin of 5.83%.The business had revenue of $17.34 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $18.58 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $2.28 EPS. MetLife’s quarterly revenue was down 2.7% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that MetLife will post 9.65 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently commented on MET. Weiss Ratings restated a “buy (b)” rating on shares of MetLife in a research report on Wednesday, October 8th. Wells Fargo & Company increased their target price on shares of MetLife from $95.00 to $96.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Jefferies Financial Group increased their target price on shares of MetLife from $100.00 to $103.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, August 11th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods dropped their target price on shares of MetLife from $94.00 to $92.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Monday, August 11th. Finally, Wolfe Research raised shares of MetLife to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, September 16th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, ten have issued a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $95.18.

MetLife Company Profile

MetLife, Inc, a financial services company, provides insurance, annuities, employee benefits, and asset management services worldwide. It operates through six segments: Retirement and Income Solutions; Group Benefits; Asia; Latin America; Europe, the Middle East and Africa; and MetLife Holdings. The company offers life, dental, group short-and long-term disability, individual disability, pet insurance, accidental death and dismemberment, vision, and accident and health coverages, as well as prepaid legal plans; administrative services-only arrangements to employers; and general and separate account, and synthetic guaranteed interest contracts, as well as private floating rate funding agreements.