Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) Posts Earnings Results, Misses Expectations By $0.02 EPS

Southwest Airlines (NYSE:LUV) issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday. The airline reported ($0.36) earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of ($0.34) by ($0.02), RTT News reports. Southwest Airlines had a return on equity of 8.91% and a net margin of 1.59%. The firm had revenue of $6.33 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $6.42 billion. During the same period last year, the company posted ($0.27) EPS. The business’s revenue was up 11.0% on a year-over-year basis.

Southwest Airlines Trading Down 0.8 %

LUV opened at $27.04 on Friday. Southwest Airlines has a twelve month low of $21.91 and a twelve month high of $39.53. The company has a quick ratio of 1.07, a current ratio of 1.09 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.78. The company has a fifty day moving average of $30.34 and a 200-day moving average of $28.53. The stock has a market cap of $16.17 billion, a PE ratio of 42.91, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.96 and a beta of 1.15.

Southwest Airlines Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 27th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, March 6th were given a dividend of $0.18 per share. This represents a $0.72 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.66%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, March 5th. Southwest Airlines’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 114.29%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts have recently weighed in on the stock. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on shares of Southwest Airlines from $24.00 to $29.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, January 26th. Sanford C. Bernstein upgraded shares of Southwest Airlines from an “underperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and upped their price objective for the stock from $26.00 to $32.00 in a research report on Tuesday, February 20th. Susquehanna lowered their price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines from $30.00 to $27.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, April 9th. Barclays lowered their price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines from $30.00 to $26.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research report on Friday. Finally, Evercore ISI reiterated an “inline” rating and set a $35.00 price objective on shares of Southwest Airlines in a research report on Tuesday, January 2nd. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have issued a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Southwest Airlines has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $31.18.

Southwest Airlines Company Profile

Southwest Airlines Co operates as a passenger airline company that provides scheduled air transportation services in the United States and near-international markets. As of December 31, 2023, the company operated a total fleet of 817 Boeing 737 aircraft; and served 121 destinations in 42 states, the District of Columbia, and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, as well as ten near-international countries, including Mexico, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Aruba, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, Belize, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, and Turks and Caicos.