Deere & Company - DE Stock Forecast, Price & News

Deere & Company manufactures and distributes various equipment worldwide. The company operates through four segments: Production and Precision Agriculture, Small Agriculture and Turf, Construction and Forestry, and Financial Services. The Production and Precision Agriculture segment provides mid-size tractors, combines, cotton pickers and strippers, sugarcane harvesters, harvesting front-end equipment, sugarcane loaders, pull-behind scrapers, and tillage and seeding equipment, as well as application equipment, including sprayers and nutrient management, and soil preparation machinery for grain growers. The Small Agriculture and Turf segment offers utility tractors, and related loaders and attachments; turf and utility equipment, including riding lawn equipment, commercial mowing equipment, golf course equipment, and utility vehicles, as well as implements for mowing, tilling, snow and debris handling, aerating, residential, commercial, golf, and sports turf care applications; other outdoor power products; and hay and forage equipment. This segment also resells products from other manufacturers. It serves dairy and livestock producers, crop producers, and turf and utility customers. The Construction and Forestry segment provides a range of backhoe loaders, crawler dozers and loaders, four-wheel-drive loaders, excavators, motor graders, articulated dump trucks, landscape and skid-steer loaders, milling machines, pavers, compactors, rollers, crushers, screens, asphalt plants, log skidders, log feller bunchers, log loaders and forwarders, log harvesters, and attachments; and roadbuilding equipment. The Financial Services segment finances sales and leases agriculture and turf, and construction and forestry equipment. It also offers wholesale financing to dealers of the foregoing equipment; and extended equipment warranties, as well as finances retail revolving charge accounts. Deere & Company was founded in 1837 and is headquartered in Moline, Illinois.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts recently commented on DE shares. Oppenheimer lowered their target price on Deere & Company from $419.00 to $365.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Monday, July 18th. Citigroup raised Deere & Company from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating and cut their target price for the stock from $435.00 to $340.00 in a research report on Thursday, July 7th. DA Davidson cut their target price on Deere & Company from $480.00 to $445.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, May 23rd. Credit Suisse Group set a $393.00 price target on Deere & Company in a research report on Tuesday, July 19th. Finally, Bank of America lowered Deere & Company from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and dropped their target price for the company from $475.00 to $450.00 in a report on Monday, April 25th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and twelve have issued a buy rating to the company's stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $398.00.

Deere & Company Trading Up 1.7 %

NYSE:DE traded up $6.24 on Friday, hitting $368.16. 1,256,761 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,237,418. The stock has a market cap of $112.52 billion, a PE ratio of 19.21, a PEG ratio of 1.23 and a beta of 1.10. The company has a current ratio of 2.07, a quick ratio of 1.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.72. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $322.56 and a 200-day moving average of $364.27. Deere & Company has a fifty-two week low of $283.81 and a fifty-two week high of $446.76.

Deere & Company (NYSE:DE - Get Rating) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, May 20th. The industrial products company reported $6.81 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $6.65 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $12.03 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $13.16 billion. Deere & Company had a return on equity of 33.58% and a net margin of 12.99%. The firm's revenue was up 9.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $5.68 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts expect that Deere & Company will post 23.3 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Deere & Company Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, August 8th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 30th were paid a dividend of $1.13 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, June 29th. This is a positive change from Deere & Company's previous quarterly dividend of $1.05. This represents a $4.52 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.23%. Deere & Company's dividend payout ratio is currently 23.58%.

Insider Transactions at Deere & Company

In other news, insider John H. Stone sold 17,145 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Thursday, May 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $4,321.07, for a total value of $74,084,745.15. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 21,087 shares of the company's stock, valued at $91,118,403.09. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Company insiders own 0.24% of the company's stock.