Stock Yards (SYBT) Increases Quarterly Dividend by 3.4%
Stock Yards Bancorp, Inc. SYBT announced a sequential dividend hike. The company declared a quarterly cash dividend of 30 cents per share, indicating a rise of 3.4%. The dividend will be paid out on Oct 2, to shareholders of record as of Sep 18.
Prior to the current hike, the company increased its dividend by 3.6% to 29 cents per share in August 2022. SYBT raised its quarterly dividend six times in the last five years. Also, it has a five-year annualized dividend growth of 3.2%. Currently, the company's payout ratio is 30% of earnings.
Considering the last day’s closing price of $47.39, Stock Yards' dividend yield currently stands at 2.45%.
James A. (Ja) Hillebrand, chairman and CEO, commented, “Solid franchise growth contributes to our ability to steadily increase dividends and to further build shareholder value. With this announcement, Stock Yards Bancorp has now raised its quarterly dividend rate a total of 16 times since 2012, resulting in a cumulative increase of 125% over that time.”
Apart from the regular dividend payments, SYBT has a share repurchase program in place. In May 2019, the company announced a new repurchase program, under which, it authorized to repurchase 1 million shares. The plan was extended in May 2023 and will expire in May 2025. The company didn't repurchase any shares in 2022 or in the first six months of 2023. The plan had nearly 741,000 shares remaining under the repurchase authorization as of Jun 30, 2023.
Stock Yards has been focused on improving its loan and deposit balance over the years. Given the strong capital position and decent balance sheet, the company is expected to continue with efficient capital deployment activities. Through this, Stock Yards will keep enhancing shareholder value.
Over the past three months, shares of SYBT have gained 8.9% compared with the industry’s upside of 12.8%.
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Stock Yards currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.
Other Banks Taking Similar Steps
Over the past month, Bank OZK OZK and The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. PNC announced an increase in their quarterly dividend payouts.
Bank OZK announced a dividend hike yet again. OZK declared a quarterly cash dividend of 36 cents per share, reflecting a rise of nearly 2.9% from the prior payout. The dividend was paid out on Jul 21 to shareholders of record as of Jul 14.
This marks 52 consecutive quarters of dividend hikes by Bank OZK. Prior to this, OZK raised its dividend by 2.9% to 35 cents per share in April 2023. We believe that such disbursements highlight the company’s operational strength and commitment to enhancing shareholders' wealth.
After passing the 2023 stress test, The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. has announced that it expects its Stress Capital Buffer ("SCB"), effective from Oct 1, 2023, to decrease to 2.5% from 2.9%.
With a lower SCB, a company typically has higher flexibility to deploy capital in share buybacks and dividends. Accordingly, PNC announced a hike in its quarterly dividend. The company declared a quarterly cash dividend of $1.55 per share, marking an increase of 3.3% from the prior payout. The dividend was paid out on Aug 5 to shareholders of record as of Jul 17.
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