Item 5. Market for Registrant’s Common Equity
ITEM 5. MARKET FOR REGISTRANT'S COMMON EQUITY, RELATED STOCKHOLDER MATTERS AND ISSUER PURCHASES OF EQUITY SECURITIES
Market Information
Our Class A common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (the "NYSE"), under the symbol "ESRT." Our Class B common stock is not listed on any exchange and is not traded. Each share of Class B common stock may be converted to one share of Class A common stock at any time.
Our operating partnership has four series of partnership units ("OP Units") - Series PR OP Units, Series ES OP Units, Series 60 OP Units and Series 250 OP Units. The Series ES OP Units, Series 60 OP Units and Series 250 OP Units (together, the "traded OP units") are listed on the NYSE Arca, Inc. exchange ("NYSE Arca") under the symbols "ESBA," "OGCP," and "FISK," respectively. The Series PR OP Units are not listed on any exchange and are not traded.
On February 26, 2025, the last sales price for our Class A common stock on the NYSE was $8.98 per share.
Holders
As of February 26, 2025, we had 537 registered holders of our Class A common stock and 528 registered holders of our Class B common stock. As of February 26, 2025, we had approximately 546 registered holders of Series PR OP Units, 766 registered holders of Series ES OP Units, 219 registered holders of Series 60 OP Units and 170 registered holders of Series 250 OP Units. Certain shares of common stock and OP Units are held in "street" name and accordingly, the number of beneficial owners of such shares of common stock and OP Units is not known or included in the foregoing totals.
Dividends
We intend to pay regular quarterly dividends to holders of our Class A common stock and Class B common stock, at least to the extent of our taxable income or as required to maintain our qualification as a REIT. Any distributions we pay in the future will depend upon our taxable income, actual results of operations, economic conditions and other factors that could differ materially from our current expectations. Our actual results of operations will be affected by a number of factors, including the revenue we receive from our properties, our operating expenses, interest expense, the ability of our tenants to meet their obligations and unanticipated expenditures.
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We declared dividends of $0.035 per share for each quarter of 2024, which equates to an annualized rate of $0.14 per share.
Our board will continue our regular review of dividend and capital allocation policies. Distributions declared by us will be authorized by our board in its sole discretion out of funds legally available therefore and will be dependent upon a number of factors, including restrictions under applicable law, our capital requirements and the distribution requirements necessary to maintain our qualification as a REIT. See ITEM 1A, "Risk Factors," and ITEM 7, "Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Conditions and Results of Operations," of this Annual Report on Form 10-K, for information regarding the sources of funds used for dividends and for a discussion of factors, if any, which may adversely affect our ability to make distributions to our securityholders.
Earnings and profits, which determine the tax treatment of distributions to securityholders, will differ from income reported for financial reporting purposes due to the differences for federal income tax purposes, including, but not limited to, treatment of loss on extinguishment of debt, revenue recognition, compensation expense, and basis of depreciable assets and estimated useful lives used to compute depreciation. Dividends paid in 2024 of $0.14 per share are classified for income tax purposes 100.0% as taxable ordinary dividends eligible for the Section 199A deduction and 0% as a return of capital.
Stockholder Return Performance
The following graph is a comparison of the cumulative total stockholder return on our Class A common stock, the Standard & Poor's 500 Index (the "S&P 500 Index"), the MSCI US REIT Index and the FTSE NAREIT Equity REIT Office Index. The graph assumes that $100.00 was invested on December 31, 2019 and dividends were reinvested without the payment of any commissions. There can be no assurance that the performance of our Class A common stock will continue in line with the same or similar trends depicted in the graph below.
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December 31, 2019 December 31, 2020 December 31, 2021 December 31, 2022 December 31, 2023 December 31, 2024
Empire State Realty Trust, Inc. $ 100.00 $ 68.49 $ 66.07 $ 51.00 $ 74.64 $ 80.60
S&P 500 Index $ 100.00 $ 118.40 $ 152.39 $ 124.79 $ 157.59 $ 197.02
MSCI US REIT Index $ 100.00 $ 92.43 $ 132.23 $ 99.82 $ 113.54 $ 123.47
FTSE NAREIT Equity REIT Office Index $ 100.00 $ 81.56 $ 99.51 $ 62.07 $ 63.34 $ 76.95
The graph is not deemed incorporated by reference into any filing made under the Securities Act of 1933, as amended (the "Securities Act"), or the Exchange Act regardless of any general statement regarding incorporation by reference in any such filing and is not otherwise deemed filed under the Securities Act or the Exchange Act.
Recent Sales of Unregistered Securities Use of Proceeds from Registered Securities
Not applicable.
Repurchases of Equity Securities Stock and Publicly Traded Operating Partnership Unit Repurchase Program
Our Board of Directors authorized the repurchase of up to $500.0 million of our Class A common stock and the Operating Partnership’s Series ES, Series 250 and Series 60 operating partnership units from January 1, 2024 through December 31, 2025. Under the program, we may purchase our Class A common stock and the Operating Partnership’s Series ES, Series 250 and Series 60 operating partnership units in accordance with applicable securities laws from time to time in the open market or in privately negotiated transactions. The timing, manner, price and amount of any repurchases will be determined by us at our discretion and will be subject to stock price, availability, trading volume, general market conditions, and applicable securities laws. The authorization does not obligate us to acquire any particular amount of securities, and the program may be suspended or discontinued at our discretion without prior notice. As of December 31, 2024, we had $500.0 million remaining of the authorized repurchase amount.
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There were no repurchases of equity securities during the three-month period ended December 31, 2024 under this repurchase program. See "Financial Statements — Note 10 Equity" in this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
ITEM 6. [RESERVED]
Not applicable.
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