Noble Corporation PLC (NYSE:NE) Announces $0.50 Quarterly Dividend

Noble Corporation PLC (NYSE:NE) declared a quarterly dividend on Monday, July 27th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, September 3rd will be given a dividend of 0.50 per share on Thursday, September 24th. This represents a c) annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.6%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, September 3rd.

Noble has a payout ratio of 71.7% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect Noble to earn $2.60 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $2.00 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 76.9%.

Noble Stock Down 0.4%

NYSE NE opened at $43.09 on Tuesday. Noble has a twelve month low of $25.24 and a twelve month high of $54.98. The stock has a market cap of $6.87 billion, a PE ratio of 30.13 and a beta of 0.92. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $43.62 and a 200 day simple moving average of $44.08. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.42, a quick ratio of 1.99 and a current ratio of 1.99.

Noble (NYSE:NE) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Monday, July 27th. The company reported $0.01 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.15 by ($0.14). Noble had a net margin of 7.17% and a return on equity of 2.32%. The firm had revenue of $719.69 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $697.98 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm earned $0.27 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was down 15.2% on a year-over-year basis. On average, research analysts forecast that Noble will post 0.81 EPS for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages recently commented on NE. Citigroup reduced their target price on Noble from $52.00 to $45.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, June 30th. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of Noble from $56.00 to $55.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, July 16th. Susquehanna reduced their price objective on shares of Noble from $55.00 to $40.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, July 8th. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Noble from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, May 2nd. Finally, Zacks Research cut shares of Noble from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 22nd. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $43.12.

About Noble

Noble (NYSE: NE) is an offshore drilling company that provides drilling services to the global oil and gas industry. The firm operates a fleet of mobile offshore drilling units and delivers contract drilling solutions for exploration and production activities. Its core business centers on executing drilling programs for upstream energy companies across a range of water depths and operating environments.

Products and services include the operation and management of offshore drilling rigs — such as drillships, semisubmersibles and jackups — along with associated technical, engineering and project management services.