In an announcement today, Duke Energy says it is done its stock repurchase program. The accelerated program of $1.5 billion was funded by money from having sold the company’s Midwest Commercial Generation organization.
The program had started on April 6 of this year and was executed by Goldman, Sachs & Co. and JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., as per an arrangement with Duke Energy.
Under the program, the shares that were retired totaled about 19.8 million. When the program started, there were about 16.6 million shares retired. At the end of the program, there 3.2 million retired. The total shares retired are based on Duke Energy’s average share price (volume weighted) during the course of the program. That formula applies only to their common stock.
Duke Energy is a Fortune 500 company that is based in Charlotte, N.C. Its assets are worth about $121 billion. It is currently the biggest electric power holding company in the US. It also operates in Latin America.
On the Nasdaq, Duke Energy Corporation (DUK) is valued at $50.92B. Today the trade price started at $74.36. Over the last year, it was traded between the prices of $69.48 and $89.97. At present day, DUK shares are fairly expensive; they are 15.52x the 2015 forecasted earnings, which is higher than the industry’s 15.51x forward p/e ratio.
DUK’s average price target is $81.56. That is about 9.68 percent above where the stock opened. Its quarterly earnings estimate is forecast to be $5.82 billion (consensus revenue prediction). If it reports such earnings, then that would be 2.18 percent lower than the quarter at the same time one year ago.
As for shareholders of DUK, they get $3.18 per share annually from Duke Energy in dividends. That is about 4.40 percent. More details about the company can be found at duke-energy.com.