Walker & Dunlop, Inc. Declares Quarterly Dividend of $0.65 (NYSE:WD)

Walker & Dunlop, Inc. (NYSE:WD - Get Free Report) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, May 2nd, RTT News reports. Stockholders of record on Thursday, May 16th will be paid a dividend of 0.65 per share by the financial services provider on Friday, May 31st. This represents a $2.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.76%.

Walker & Dunlop has raised its dividend by an average of 20.5% per year over the last three years and has increased its dividend every year for the last 5 years.

Walker & Dunlop Stock Up 1.6 %

Shares of WD stock traded up $1.44 on Thursday, hitting $94.20. The company had a trading volume of 266,083 shares, compared to its average volume of 226,032. The firm has a market cap of $3.17 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.62 and a beta of 1.54. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $93.85 and a 200-day moving average price of $91.41. Walker & Dunlop has a twelve month low of $61.06 and a twelve month high of $113.67.

Walker & Dunlop (NYSE:WD - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, February 15th. The financial services provider reported $1.42 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.04 by $0.38. The business had revenue of $274.30 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $276.76 million. Walker & Dunlop had a return on equity of 9.15% and a net margin of 10.18%. The company's revenue for the quarter was down 3.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $1.41 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that Walker & Dunlop will post 4.2 EPS for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Walker & Dunlop news, Director Howard W. Smith III sold 20,166 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $93.56, for a total transaction of $1,886,730.96. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 191,508 shares in the company, valued at approximately $17,917,488.48. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other Walker & Dunlop news, Director Howard W. Smith III sold 20,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $93.81, for a total transaction of $1,876,200.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now directly owns 191,508 shares in the company, valued at approximately $17,965,365.48. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director Howard W. Smith III sold 20,166 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, March 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $93.56, for a total value of $1,886,730.96. Following the sale, the director now owns 191,508 shares of the company's stock, valued at $17,917,488.48. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 46,074 shares of company stock worth $4,328,255. Corporate insiders own 5.47% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently weighed in on WD. Wedbush lowered Walker & Dunlop from an "outperform" rating to a "neutral" rating and cut their price target for the company from $130.00 to $95.00 in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. StockNews.com lowered Walker & Dunlop from a "hold" rating to a "sell" rating in a research note on Friday, March 22nd. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods restated a "market perform" rating and issued a $105.00 price target on shares of Walker & Dunlop in a research note on Tuesday, March 26th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating and three have assigned a hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $100.00.

Walker & Dunlop Company Profile

Walker & Dunlop, Inc, through its subsidiaries, originates, sells, and services a range of multifamily and other commercial real estate financing products and services for owners and developers of real estate in the United States. It operates through three segments: Capital Markets, Servicing & Asset Management, and Corporate.