Truckload carrier Heartland Express announced Friday a 50-cent-per-share special dividend. The North Liberty, Iowa-based company also announced an increase of 3 million shares to its buyback program.
The special dividend was announced in addition to its regular quarterly cash dividend of 2 cents per share. The dividends equal approximately $41.1 million in total payments to shareholders, to be distributed on Oct. 1.
Insiders, including Chairman and CEO Mike Gerdin’s family, as well as directors and executives, hold 50% of the company’s outstanding shares, according to Yahoo Finance.
Heartland Express (NASDAQ: HTLD) has paid three special dividends in the past. The company paid $1 dividends in 2012 and 2010 and $2 in 2007. Including the dividends announced, the company will have distributed a total of $535 million in cash payments to investors.
The company also announced it had increased its current share repurchase authorization by 3 million shares to a total of 6.745 million. The timing of the repurchases is discretionary.
Heartland ended the second quarter with $167.2 million in cash on the balance sheet and no outstanding debt. It generated net cash from operations of $62.8 million through the first half of 2021, increasing its cash balance by $53.4 million.
This cash deployment to shareholders doesn’t necessarily signal that Heartland won’t make acquisitions like it has done in the past or like other carriers have done more recently. Heartland had $205 million in cash on its balance sheet when it acquired Millis Transfer in 2019 and has utilized debt to facilitate deals in the past.
Heartland’s announcement follows a similar action by refrigerated carrier Marten Transport (NASDAQ: MRTN) on Tuesday.
Shares of HTLD were up 1.8% at 10:45 a.m. EDT Friday compared to the S&P 500, which was up 0.6%.
