Arko Corp. (NASDAQ:ARKO) Given Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Brokerages

Arko Corp. (NASDAQ:ARKO) has earned a consensus recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the five research firms that are covering the company, Marketbeat.com reports. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, one has assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. The average 1 year target price among brokerages that have covered the stock in the last year is $7.35.

ARKO has been the topic of several recent research reports. Raymond James lowered their target price on shares of Arko from $11.00 to $10.00 and set a “strong-buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, May 9th. Stifel Nicolaus lowered Arko from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating and lowered their price objective for the stock from $8.50 to $7.50 in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. BMO Capital Markets raised their price target on Arko from $4.50 to $5.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Monday, May 12th. Capital One Financial started coverage on Arko in a research report on Thursday, May 8th. They issued an “overweight” rating and a $8.00 price target on the stock. Finally, Wall Street Zen cut shares of Arko from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a research report on Friday.

Arko Price Performance

Shares of ARKO opened at $4.34 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $497.71 million, a PE ratio of 27.13 and a beta of 0.72. The company’s 50-day moving average is $4.31 and its 200-day moving average is $5.65. Arko has a fifty-two week low of $3.51 and a fifty-two week high of $7.84. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.86, a current ratio of 1.63 and a quick ratio of 1.13.

Arko (NASDAQ:ARKO) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, May 8th. The company reported ($0.12) earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.17) by $0.05. The company had revenue of $1.83 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.85 billion. Arko had a return on equity of 8.88% and a net margin of 0.27%. Equities analysts forecast that Arko will post 0.2 EPS for the current year.

Arko Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 30th. Investors of record on Monday, May 19th were paid a $0.03 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, May 19th. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.76%. Arko’s dividend payout ratio is 400.00%.

Institutional Trading of Arko

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the business. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Arko in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $368,000. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC boosted its position in Arko by 90.9% during the fourth quarter. Tower Research Capital LLC TRC now owns 9,742 shares of the company’s stock valued at $64,000 after acquiring an additional 4,639 shares during the last quarter. Prudential Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Arko during the fourth quarter valued at $195,000. Barclays PLC boosted its position in Arko by 5.3% during the fourth quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 180,737 shares of the company’s stock valued at $1,191,000 after acquiring an additional 9,137 shares during the last quarter. Finally, American Century Companies Inc. boosted its position in Arko by 12.2% during the fourth quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 146,511 shares of the company’s stock valued at $966,000 after acquiring an additional 15,899 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 78.29% of the company’s stock.

Arko Company Profile

Arko Corp. operates convenience stores in the United States. It operates through Retail, Wholesale, Fleet Fueling, and GPMP segments. The Retail segment engages in the sale of fuel and merchandise to retail consumers. Its Wholesale segment supplies fuel to third-party dealers and consignment agents. The Fleet Fueling segment supplies fuel to proprietary and third-party cardlock, and issuance of proprietary fuel cards.