BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE) Announces $0.44 Quarterly Dividend

BCE Inc. (TSE:BCE - Get Free Report) NYSE: BCE announced a quarterly dividend on Monday, June 16th, TickerTech Dividends reports. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, July 15th will be paid a dividend of 0.4375 per share on Tuesday, July 15th. This represents a $1.75 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.64%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, June 16th.

BCE Stock Down 0.8%

BCE stock traded down C$0.24 during midday trading on Friday, hitting C$31.01. The company's stock had a trading volume of 6,318,020 shares, compared to its average volume of 3,946,817. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 226.73, a current ratio of 0.62 and a quick ratio of 0.43. BCE has a twelve month low of C$28.73 and a twelve month high of C$49.13. The company's fifty day moving average price is C$30.14 and its 200 day moving average price is C$32.72. The stock has a market capitalization of C$28.09 billion, a P/E ratio of 104.03, a PEG ratio of 4.67 and a beta of 0.48.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities research analysts have issued reports on the stock. Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price target on shares of BCE from C$37.00 to C$35.00 and set a "sector perform" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, May 9th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on shares of BCE from C$28.00 to C$29.00 in a research note on Monday, May 12th. Scotiabank upgraded shares of BCE from a "hold" rating to a "strong-buy" rating and set a C$39.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Monday, June 2nd. National Bankshares set a C$35.00 price objective on shares of BCE and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research note on Friday, June 6th. Finally, UBS Group lowered their price objective on shares of BCE from C$34.00 to C$32.00 in a research note on Wednesday, May 21st. Two analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of C$37.04.

About BCE

BCE is both a wireless and internet service provider, offering wireless, broadband, television, and landline phone services in Canada. It is one of the big three national wireless carriers, with its roughly 10 million customers constituting about 30% of the market. It is also the ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrierthe legacy telephone provider) throughout much of the eastern half of Canada, including in the most populous Canadian provincesOntario and Quebec.