The Dividend Daily

Late on Tuesday, analysts at Deutsche Bank said they were cutting the current price target on healthcare company Humana Inc. (HUM) due to the recent and announced retirements of some of the members of the management team.

The analysts maintain a “Hold” rating on HUM and reduced the price target from $80 to $68. This new valuation suggests little to no upside to Wednesday’s closing price of $68.96.

A Deutsche Bank analyst noted, “The turnover of Humana’s senior management team continues to play out as CFO Jim Bloem announced that he will retire at the end of the 2013. This follows the retirement of former CEO Mike McCallister at the end of 2012. Mr. Bloem captured the entire upcycle in MA during his tenure as CFO and now could be exiting right in front of a potential MA downturn that could begin in 2014 based on the highly challenging prelim 2014 MA rate proposal. We continue to see elevated EPS the headwinds for the MCO industry in 2014 and reduce our PT for HUM to $68 from $80.”

Humana shares were inactive during pre-market trading on Wednesday. The stock is down -22.52% over the past twelve months.

The Bottom Line
Shares of Humana (HUM) have a dividend yield of 1.51% based on last night’s closing price of $68.96 and the company’s annualized dividend payout of $1.04 per share.

Humana Inc (HUM) is not recommended at this time, holding a Dividend.com DARS™ Rating of 3.2 out of 5 stars.

Be sure to visit our complete recommended list of the Best Dividend Stocks, as well as a detailed explanation of our ratings system here.