Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCOI) Increases Dividend to $1.01 Per Share

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCOI) announced a quarterly dividend on Thursday, February 27th, RTT News reports. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 13th will be given a dividend of 1.005 per share by the technology company on Friday, March 28th. This represents a $4.02 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.02%. This is a positive change from Cogent Communications’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.00.

Cogent Communications has raised its dividend payment by an average of 7.3% per year over the last three years and has increased its dividend annually for the last 13 consecutive years. Cogent Communications has a dividend payout ratio of -198.0% indicating that the company cannot currently cover its dividend with earnings alone and is relying on its balance sheet to cover its dividend payments. Research analysts expect Cogent Communications to earn ($2.63) per share next year, which means the company may not be able to cover its $3.98 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of -151.3%.

Cogent Communications Stock Performance

Shares of Cogent Communications stock opened at $80.11 on Thursday. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $76.77 and its 200-day simple moving average is $77.07. The company has a quick ratio of 2.03, a current ratio of 2.03 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.87. The firm has a market cap of $3.93 billion, a PE ratio of 102.71 and a beta of 0.40. Cogent Communications has a 52 week low of $50.80 and a 52 week high of $86.76.

Cogent Communications (NASDAQ:CCOI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, February 27th. The technology company reported ($0.91) EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of ($1.22) by $0.31. Cogent Communications had a net margin of 3.73% and a negative return on equity of 36.31%. Equities analysts forecast that Cogent Communications will post -4.55 earnings per share for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Separately, UBS Group assumed coverage on shares of Cogent Communications in a research report on Thursday, November 14th. They set a “buy” rating and a $102.00 price objective for the company. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, four have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $80.25.

Insider Buying and Selling at Cogent Communications

In other news, CRO James Bubeck sold 1,920 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $81.42, for a total value of $156,326.40. Following the sale, the executive now directly owns 51,462 shares in the company, valued at approximately $4,190,036.04. This trade represents a 3.60 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, VP Henry W. Kilmer sold 4,800 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $75.61, for a total value of $362,928.00. Following the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 33,800 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,555,618. The trade was a 12.44 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 13,440 shares of company stock valued at $1,057,910 in the last 90 days. Company insiders own 11.40% of the company’s stock.

Cogent Communications Company Profile

Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc, through its subsidiaries, provides high-speed Internet access, private network, and data center colocation space services in North America, Europe, Oceania, South America, and Africa. The company offers on-net Internet access and private network services to law firms, financial services firms, and advertising and marketing firms, as well as heath care providers, educational institutions and other professional services businesses, other Internet service providers, telephone companies, cable television companies, web hosting companies, media service providers, mobile phone operators, content delivery network companies, and commercial content and application service providers.