Bank of Nova Scotia (TSE:BNS) Rating Increased to Buy at Bank of America

Bank of America upgraded shares of Bank of Nova Scotia (TSE:BNS) (NYSE:BNS) from a neutral rating to a buy rating in a research note released on Tuesday morning,BayStreet.CA reports. Bank of America currently has C$90.00 price objective on the bank’s stock, up from their prior price objective of C$73.00.

A number of other brokerages have also recently weighed in on BNS. Cibc World Mkts upgraded shares of Bank of Nova Scotia from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Friday, September 20th. CIBC upgraded shares of Bank of Nova Scotia from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and lifted their price target for the stock from C$78.00 to C$82.00 in a research note on Friday, September 20th. Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price target on shares of Bank of Nova Scotia from C$65.00 to C$69.00 and gave the stock a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 28th. Royal Bank of Canada lifted their price target on shares of Bank of Nova Scotia from C$62.00 to C$65.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 28th. Finally, TD Securities lifted their price target on shares of Bank of Nova Scotia from C$80.00 to C$82.00 in a research note on Friday, November 15th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, four have issued a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of C$73.75.

Bank of Nova Scotia Stock Performance

Shares of BNS stock opened at C$78.38 on Tuesday. The stock has a market capitalization of C$97.19 billion, a P/E ratio of 13.73, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a 50 day moving average price of C$72.91 and a 200 day moving average price of C$67.29. Bank of Nova Scotia has a fifty-two week low of C$56.83 and a fifty-two week high of C$78.58.

Bank of Nova Scotia (TSE:BNS) (NYSE:BNS) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, August 27th. The bank reported C$1.63 earnings per share for the quarter, meeting analysts’ consensus estimates of C$1.63. The firm had revenue of C$8.36 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of C$8.50 billion. Bank of Nova Scotia had a net margin of 25.38% and a return on equity of 9.49%. On average, research analysts forecast that Bank of Nova Scotia will post 7.1286267 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Bank of Nova Scotia Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, October 29th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, October 2nd were given a dividend of $1.06 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, October 2nd. This represents a $4.24 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 5.41%. Bank of Nova Scotia’s dividend payout ratio is presently 74.26%.

Bank of Nova Scotia Company Profile

The Bank of Nova Scotia provides various banking products and services in Canada, the United States, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Colombia, the Caribbean and Central America, and internationally. It operates through Canadian Banking, International Banking, Global Wealth Management, and Global Banking and Markets segments.