Imperial Oil (TSE:IMO) Hits New 52-Week High – Here’s What Happened

Shares of Imperial Oil Limited (TSE:IMO) (NYSEMKT:IMO) hit a new 52-week high during trading on Friday . The company traded as high as C$185.30 and last traded at C$184.31, with a volume of 215742 shares trading hands. The stock had previously closed at C$181.62.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have recently commented on IMO. National Bank Financial raised their target price on shares of Imperial Oil from C$139.00 to C$212.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 31st. Desjardins raised their target price on shares of Imperial Oil from C$120.00 to C$132.00 and gave the company a “sell” rating in a research note on Friday, February 20th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their price target on shares of Imperial Oil from C$155.00 to C$149.00 in a report on Monday, May 4th. TD lowered their price target on shares of Imperial Oil from C$157.00 to C$156.00 and set a “sell” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday. Finally, Raymond James Financial raised their price target on shares of Imperial Oil from C$107.00 to C$126.00 in a report on Monday, March 30th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a Hold rating and six have issued a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Strong Sell” and an average price target of C$137.00.

Imperial Oil Stock Performance

The stock’s fifty day moving average is C$174.12 and its two-hundred day moving average is C$149.68. The firm has a market capitalization of C$89.46 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 31.35, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.21 and a beta of 0.65. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 18.20, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a current ratio of 1.23.

Imperial Oil (TSE:IMO) (NYSEMKT:IMO) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, May 1st. The company reported C$1.94 earnings per share for the quarter. The business had revenue of C$12.42 billion during the quarter. Imperial Oil had a net margin of 6.27% and a return on equity of 13.43%. Analysts forecast that Imperial Oil Limited will post 8.6164609 earnings per share for the current year.

Imperial Oil Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, April 1st. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, April 1st were paid a dividend of $0.87 per share. This is a positive change from Imperial Oil’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.72. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, March 5th. This represents a $3.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.9%. Imperial Oil’s payout ratio is currently 51.36%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, insider Ian Robert Laing sold 4,100 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of C$176.63, for a total value of C$724,183.00. 71.26% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Imperial Oil

Imperial Oil is one of Canada’s largest integrated oil companies, focusing on upstream operations, petroleum refining operations, and the marketing of petroleum products. Production averaged 398 thousand barrels of oil equivalent per day in 2020. The company estimates that it holds 5.2 billion boe of proved and probable crude oil and natural gas reserves. Imperial remains the largest refiner of petroleum products in Canada, operating three refineries with a combined processing capacity of 421 mboe/d.