W. P. Carey Inc. (NYSE:WPC) Receives Average Recommendation of “Hold” from Brokerages

Shares of W. P. Carey Inc. (NYSE:WPC) have been assigned a consensus recommendation of “Hold” from the nine brokerages that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat reports. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, five have given a hold recommendation and three have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year price objective among brokers that have covered the stock in the last year is $63.75.

Several equities analysts have recently weighed in on WPC shares. Scotiabank upped their price objective on shares of W. P. Carey from $59.00 to $63.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. Barclays upped their price target on W. P. Carey from $56.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “underweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. BMO Capital Markets raised W. P. Carey from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $60.00 to $67.00 in a research note on Tuesday, February 18th. JMP Securities reiterated a “market perform” rating on shares of W. P. Carey in a report on Thursday, February 13th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on shares of W. P. Carey from $58.00 to $66.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday, March 10th.

W. P. Carey Trading Down 0.7 %

Shares of WPC stock opened at $62.44 on Friday. W. P. Carey has a fifty-two week low of $52.91 and a fifty-two week high of $66.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.95, a quick ratio of 0.98 and a current ratio of 0.98. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $59.90 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $58.43. The company has a market cap of $13.66 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.87, a PEG ratio of 1.06 and a beta of 0.95.

W. P. Carey Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, April 15th. Investors of record on Monday, March 31st will be issued a dividend of $0.89 per share. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 31st. This is a boost from W. P. Carey’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.88. This represents a $3.56 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.70%. W. P. Carey’s payout ratio is 170.33%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On W. P. Carey

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of WPC. RFG Advisory LLC boosted its position in W. P. Carey by 91.7% in the fourth quarter. RFG Advisory LLC now owns 6,373 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $347,000 after purchasing an additional 3,049 shares during the last quarter. Stifel Financial Corp raised its stake in shares of W. P. Carey by 7.0% during the 3rd quarter. Stifel Financial Corp now owns 31,784 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $1,980,000 after purchasing an additional 2,075 shares during the period. FMR LLC boosted its holdings in shares of W. P. Carey by 103.3% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 806,082 shares of the real estate investment trust’s stock worth $50,219,000 after buying an additional 409,593 shares during the last quarter. Erste Asset Management GmbH bought a new position in W. P. Carey during the third quarter valued at about $1,267,000. Finally, Signet Financial Management LLC purchased a new stake in W. P. Carey during the fourth quarter worth about $1,942,000. 73.73% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About W. P. Carey

W. P. Carey ranks among the largest net lease REITs with a well-diversified portfolio of high-quality, operationally critical commercial real estate, which includes 1,424 net lease properties covering approximately 173 million square feet and a portfolio of 89 self-storage operating properties as of December 31, 2023.