Hershey - HSY Stock Forecast, Price & News

The Hershey Company, together with its subsidiaries, engages in the manufacture and sale of confectionery products and pantry items in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: North America Confectionery, North America Salty Snacks, and International. It offers chocolate and non-chocolate confectionery products; gum and mint refreshment products, including mints, chewing gums, and bubble gums; pantry items, such as baking ingredients, toppings, beverages, and sundae syrups; and snack items comprising spreads, meat snacks, bars and snack bites, mixes, popcorn, and protein bars. The company provides its products primarily under the Hershey's, Reese's, Kisses, Jolly Rancher, Almond Joy, Brookside, barkTHINS, Cadbury, Good & Plenty, Heath, Kit Kat, Payday, Rolo, Twizzlers, Whoppers, York, Ice Breakers, Breath Savers, Bubble Yum, Lily's, SkinnyPop, Pirates Booty, Paqui, Dot's Homestyle Pretzels, and ONE Bar brands, as well as under the Pelon Pelo Rico, IO-IO, and Sofit brands. It markets and sells its products to wholesale distributors, chain grocery stores, mass merchandisers, chain drug stores, vending companies, wholesale clubs, convenience stores, dollar stores, concessionaires, and department stores. The company was founded in 1894 and is headquartered in Hershey, Pennsylvania.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have recently issued reports on the stock. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on shares of Hershey from $219.00 to $227.00 in a research note on Friday, July 29th. Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on shares of Hershey from $214.00 to $237.00 in a research note on Friday, April 29th. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on shares of Hershey from $215.00 to $255.00 in a research note on Friday, April 29th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Hershey from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research report on Saturday, May 7th. Finally, Mizuho boosted their target price on shares of Hershey from $200.00 to $210.00 in a research note on Friday, April 29th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $219.64.

Hershey Price Performance

HSY Stock traded up $2.31 on Monday, reaching $228.07. 3,634 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,058,870. The company has a quick ratio of 0.37, a current ratio of 0.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.16. The firm has a market cap of $46.75 billion, a PE ratio of 28.72, a P/E/G ratio of 3.59 and a beta of 0.34. Hershey has a twelve month low of $167.80 and a twelve month high of $231.96. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $218.15 and a 200-day moving average of $214.72.

Hershey (NYSE:HSY - Get Rating) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, July 28th. The company reported $1.80 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.69 by $0.11. The firm had revenue of $2.37 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $2.24 billion. Hershey had a return on equity of 60.62% and a net margin of 16.76%. The firm's revenue for the quarter was up 19.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.47 EPS. As a group, equities analysts predict that Hershey will post 8.2 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Hershey Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 15th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 19th will be paid a $1.036 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, August 18th. This represents a $4.14 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.82%. This is an increase from Hershey's previous quarterly dividend of $0.90. Hershey's dividend payout ratio is 45.80%.

Insider Activity

In related news, CEO Michele Buck sold 5,000 shares of Hershey stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, June 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $209.15, for a total value of $1,045,750.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 185,555 shares of the company's stock, valued at $38,808,828.25. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In other Hershey news, CEO Michele Buck sold 5,000 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, June 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $209.15, for a total value of $1,045,750.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 185,555 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $38,808,828.25. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, SVP Jason Reiman sold 150 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, June 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $209.15, for a total transaction of $31,372.50. Following the completion of the sale, the senior vice president now owns 16,317 shares in the company, valued at $3,412,700.55. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 861,438 shares of company stock worth $189,878,552 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 0.34% of the company's stock.