Saratoga Investment - SAR Stock Forecast, Price & News

Saratoga Investment Corp. is a business development company specializing in leveraged and management buyouts, acquisition financings, growth financings, recapitalization, debt refinancing, and transitional financing transactions at the lower end of middle market companies. It structures its investments as debt and equity by investing through first and second lien loans, mezzanine debt, co-investments, select high yield bonds, senior secured bonds, unsecured bonds, and preferred and common equity. The firm prefers to invest in aerospace, automotive aftermarket and services, business products and services, consumer products and services, education, environmental services, industrial services, financial services, food and beverage, healthcare products and services, logistics, distribution, manufacturing, restaurants services, food services, software services, technology services, specialty chemical, media and telecommunications. It seeks to invest in the United States. The firm primarily invests $5 million to $50 million in companies having EBITDA of $2 million or greater and revenues of $8 million to $250 million. The firm prefer to take a majority stake. It invests through direct lending as well as participation in loan syndicates. The firm was formerly known as GSC Investment Corp. Saratoga Investment Corp. is based in New York, New York with an additional office in Florham Park, New Jersey.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on SAR shares. Raymond James reduced their price objective on shares of Saratoga Investment from $31.00 to $28.50 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research note on Friday, July 8th. StockNews.com upgraded shares of Saratoga Investment from a "sell" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Thursday, August 4th. Compass Point reduced their price objective on shares of Saratoga Investment to $29.00 and set a "na" rating for the company in a research note on Monday, May 16th. Finally, Hovde Group reduced their price objective on shares of Saratoga Investment to $28.00 in a research note on Friday, May 20th. One analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Saratoga Investment has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $29.50.

Saratoga Investment Price Performance

Shares of SAR traded up $0.32 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, reaching $24.88. 14,323 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 38,849. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $24.08 and a 200 day moving average price of $25.93. The company has a market cap of $296.82 million, a price-to-earnings ratio of 12.16 and a beta of 1.37. The company has a current ratio of 0.17, a quick ratio of 0.17 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.07. Saratoga Investment has a 1 year low of $22.35 and a 1 year high of $30.25.

Saratoga Investment (NYSE:SAR - Get Rating) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 6th. The financial services provider reported $0.53 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts' consensus estimates of $0.55 by ($0.02). The firm had revenue of $18.68 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $18.79 million. Saratoga Investment had a net margin of 31.95% and a return on equity of 7.56%. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Saratoga Investment will post 2.26 earnings per share for the current year.

Saratoga Investment Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 29th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, June 14th were given a dividend of $0.53 per share. The ex-dividend date was Monday, June 13th. This represents a $2.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 8.52%. Saratoga Investment's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 104.95%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, Director Steven M. Looney bought 1,250 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 2nd. The stock was bought at an average cost of $23.54 per share, for a total transaction of $29,425.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now owns 3,758 shares of the company's stock, valued at $88,463.32. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 14.00% of the stock is owned by company insiders.