Sun Life Financial Inc. (TSE:SLF) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Analysts

Sun Life Financial Inc. (TSE:SLF) (NYSE:SLF) has been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the ten ratings firms that are covering the firm, Marketbeat reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, five have given a hold recommendation, three have issued a buy recommendation and one has given a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 12-month target price among brokers that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is C$96.44.

Several research analysts have recently commented on the stock. Barclays lowered their target price on shares of Sun Life Financial from C$84.00 to C$83.00 in a report on Friday, January 9th. Desjardins boosted their price target on Sun Life Financial from C$96.00 to C$101.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, February 13th. Jefferies Financial Group increased their price target on Sun Life Financial from C$97.00 to C$103.00 in a research report on Friday, February 13th. Scotiabank lifted their price objective on Sun Life Financial from C$93.00 to C$96.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Friday, February 13th. Finally, TD Securities cut their target price on Sun Life Financial from C$104.00 to C$102.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 12th.

Sun Life Financial Trading Down 1.6%

SLF stock opened at C$88.12 on Friday. Sun Life Financial has a 52 week low of C$74.56 and a 52 week high of C$94.76. The company has a market capitalization of C$48.81 billion, a PE ratio of 14.33, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.33 and a beta of 0.76. The company’s 50-day simple moving average is C$88.08 and its 200 day simple moving average is C$84.93. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 74.49, a quick ratio of 84,866.00 and a current ratio of 2.78.

Sun Life Financial (TSE:SLF) (NYSE:SLF) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 11th. The financial services provider reported C$1.96 earnings per share for the quarter. The business had revenue of C$8.67 billion during the quarter. Sun Life Financial had a net margin of 9.74% and a return on equity of 14.68%. As a group, sell-side analysts anticipate that Sun Life Financial will post 6.9230769 earnings per share for the current year.

Sun Life Financial Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, March 31st. Investors of record on Tuesday, March 31st will be paid a $0.92 dividend. This represents a $3.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.2%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, February 25th. Sun Life Financial’s payout ratio is 57.24%.

Sun Life Financial Company Profile

Sun Life Financial is one of Canada’s Big Three life insurance companies along with Great-West Lifeco and Manulife. Sun Life provides insurance, retirement, and wealth-management services to individual and corporate customers in Canada, the United States, and Asia. It also owns MFS Investment Management, a Boston-based asset-management firm. Sun Life generates about a third of its profit from asset-management operations.