Flowers Foods, Inc. produces and markets packaged bakery products in the United States. It offers fresh breads, buns, rolls, snack cakes, and tortillas, as well as frozen breads and rolls under the Nature's Own, Dave's Killer Bread, Wonder, Canyon Bakehouse, Mrs. Freshley's, and Tastykake brand names. The company distributes its products through a direct-store-delivery distribution and a warehouse delivery system, as well as operates 46 bakeries comprising 44 owned and two leased. Its customers include mass merchandisers, supermarkets and other retailers, convenience stores, national and regional restaurants, quick-serve chains, retail in-store bakeries, foodservice distributors, food wholesalers, institutions, dollar stores, and vending companies. The company was formerly known as Flowers Industries and changed its name to Flowers Foods, Inc. in 2001. Flowers Foods, Inc. was founded in 1919 and is headquartered in Thomasville, Georgia.
Flowers Foods Price Performance
Flowers Foods stock traded up $0.05 during trading on Friday, reaching $27.68. The company had a trading volume of 1,087,334 shares, compared to its average volume of 897,543. The firm's 50-day simple moving average is $26.53 and its 200 day simple moving average is $26.74. Flowers Foods has a 1-year low of $22.72 and a 1-year high of $29.73. The firm has a market capitalization of $5.87 billion, a PE ratio of 27.14 and a beta of 0.27. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.61, a quick ratio of 1.25 and a current ratio of 1.52.
Flowers Foods (NYSE:FLO - Get Rating) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, May 19th. The company reported $0.44 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.38 by $0.06. Flowers Foods had a net margin of 4.93% and a return on equity of 18.97%. The company had revenue of $1.44 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $1.40 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $0.41 EPS. The firm's quarterly revenue was up 10.3% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that Flowers Foods will post 1.25 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Flowers Foods Increases Dividend
The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, June 23rd. Shareholders of record on Thursday, June 9th were paid a dividend of $0.22 per share. This represents a $0.88 annualized dividend and a yield of 3.18%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, June 8th. This is a boost from Flowers Foods's previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. Flowers Foods's payout ratio is 86.28%.
Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades
FLO has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft dropped their price target on shares of Flowers Foods from $27.00 to $26.00 in a research note on Monday, May 23rd. StockNews.com raised shares of Flowers Foods from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Monday, May 23rd.
Insiders Place Their Bets
In other Flowers Foods news, CEO Ryals Mcmullian sold 66,000 shares of Flowers Foods stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $26.54, for a total transaction of $1,751,640.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 1,934,000 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $51,328,360. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. 11.79% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.