QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) Plans $0.85 Quarterly Dividend

QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) announced a quarterly dividend on Friday, January 17th,RTT News reports. Investors of record on Thursday, March 6th will be given a dividend of 0.85 per share by the wireless technology company on Thursday, March 27th. This represents a $3.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.07%.

QUALCOMM has raised its dividend by an average of 7.2% per year over the last three years and has raised its dividend annually for the last 22 consecutive years. QUALCOMM has a payout ratio of 27.6% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities research analysts expect QUALCOMM to earn $10.50 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.40 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 32.4%.

QUALCOMM Trading Up 2.0 %

Shares of NASDAQ QCOM traded up $3.21 during trading on Friday, reaching $164.64. The company had a trading volume of 1,217,130 shares, compared to its average volume of 6,536,742. QUALCOMM has a 12 month low of $139.26 and a 12 month high of $230.63. The company has a quick ratio of 1.79, a current ratio of 2.40 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.51. The stock has a market cap of $182.91 billion, a P/E ratio of 18.36, a PEG ratio of 2.63 and a beta of 1.25. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $159.21 and its 200-day moving average price is $169.34.

QUALCOMM (NASDAQ:QCOM) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The wireless technology company reported $2.26 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.01 by $0.25. The business had revenue of $10.24 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $9.90 billion. QUALCOMM had a net margin of 26.03% and a return on equity of 38.81%. As a group, research analysts expect that QUALCOMM will post 9.09 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

QCOM has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. KeyCorp downgraded QUALCOMM from an “overweight” rating to a “sector weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 8th. Sanford C. Bernstein lifted their target price on QUALCOMM from $200.00 to $215.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, November 7th. StockNews.com cut QUALCOMM from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Barclays lowered their price objective on shares of QUALCOMM from $200.00 to $185.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Friday. Finally, Melius Research started coverage on shares of QUALCOMM in a research note on Monday, December 9th. They set a “hold” rating and a $180.00 target price on the stock. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, fourteen have given a hold rating, fifteen have given a buy rating and one has issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, QUALCOMM presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $206.57.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, General Counsel Ann C. Chaplin sold 2,587 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $158.12, for a total value of $409,056.44. Following the transaction, the general counsel now owns 19,739 shares in the company, valued at $3,121,130.68. The trade was a 11.59 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CAO Neil Martin sold 1,304 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, November 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $155.00, for a total value of $202,120.00. Following the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 94 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $14,570. The trade was a 93.28 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 26,882 shares of company stock worth $4,314,649. 0.08% of the stock is owned by insiders.

QUALCOMM Company Profile

QUALCOMM Incorporated engages in the development and commercialization of foundational technologies for the wireless industry worldwide. It operates through three segments: Qualcomm CDMA Technologies (QCT); Qualcomm Technology Licensing (QTL); and Qualcomm Strategic Initiatives (QSI). The QCT segment develops and supplies integrated circuits and system software based on 3G/4G/5G and other technologies for use in wireless voice and data communications, networking, computing, multimedia, and position location products.