Rent-A-Center, Inc. (NASDAQ:RCII – Get Rating) saw a large decrease in short interest in May. As of May 15th, there was short interest totalling 6,000,000 shares, a decrease of 16.6% from the April 30th total of 7,190,000 shares. Approximately 11.4% of the company’s shares are short sold. Based on an average daily volume of 1,230,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is currently 4.9 days.

RCII has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Raymond James lowered shares of Rent-A-Center from a “strong-buy” rating to an “outperform” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $65.00 to $40.00 in a report on Friday, February 25th. Zacks Investment Research upgraded shares of Rent-A-Center from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating and set a $28.00 price objective on the stock in a report on Monday, May 9th. KeyCorp cut their price objective on shares of Rent-A-Center from $68.00 to $44.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, February 25th. Finally, StockNews.com initiated coverage on shares of Rent-A-Center in a report on Thursday, March 31st. They set a “hold” rating on the stock. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and four have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $49.25.

NASDAQ RCII traded down $0.80 during mid-day trading on Wednesday, hitting $26.74. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 31,055 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,223,966. Rent-A-Center has a 52-week low of $22.70 and a 52-week high of $67.76. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $25.75 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $35.84. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.68, a current ratio of 3.25 and a quick ratio of 0.73. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.58 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.48 and a beta of 1.55.

Rent-A-Center (NASDAQ:RCII – Get Rating) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 4th. The company reported $0.74 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.71 by $0.03. Rent-A-Center had a net margin of 1.87% and a return on equity of 48.47%. The firm had revenue of $1.13 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.11 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $1.32 earnings per share. Rent-A-Center’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts forecast that Rent-A-Center will post 4.64 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, April 22nd. Investors of record on Tuesday, April 5th were issued a $0.34 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, April 4th. This represents a $1.36 annualized dividend and a yield of 5.09%. Rent-A-Center’s payout ratio is 106.25%.

A number of large investors have recently modified their holdings of RCII. Ieq Capital LLC acquired a new stake in Rent-A-Center in the first quarter valued at approximately $50,808,000. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Rent-A-Center in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $30,545,000. Moors & Cabot Inc. acquired a new stake in Rent-A-Center in the third quarter valued at approximately $334,000. Victory Capital Management Inc. grew its position in shares of Rent-A-Center by 1,220.7% during the first quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 270,330 shares of the company’s stock worth $6,520,000 after buying an additional 249,861 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Philadelphia Financial Management of San Francisco LLC grew its position in shares of Rent-A-Center by 255.0% during the first quarter. Philadelphia Financial Management of San Francisco LLC now owns 342,345 shares of the company’s stock worth $8,624,000 after buying an additional 245,902 shares in the last quarter. 81.66% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Rent-A-Center Company Profile (Get Rating)

Rent-A-Center, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, leases household durable goods to customers on a lease-to-own basis. The company operates in four segments: Rent-A-Center Business, Acima, Mexico, and Franchising. It offers furniture and accessories, appliances, consumer electronics, computers, tablets and smartphones, tools, tires, handbags, and other accessories under rental purchase agreements.

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