As of 1:26 a.m. ET in New York on Saturday, December 27, 2025, U.S. stock exchanges are closed—meaning AGNC Investment Corp. (Nasdaq: AGNC) won’t trade again until the next regular session.
Still, the weekend is a useful moment to take inventory—because AGNC is one of those stocks where macro headlines (Fed policy, Treasury yields, mortgage rates, and mortgage-bond spreads) can matter as much as company-specific news.
AGNC stock price check: where shares stand heading into the next session
AGNC was last quoted around $10.85 per share, with an intraday range of roughly $10.81 to $10.92 and volume around 10.1 million shares in the most recently reported session.
With markets closed right now, Monday’s open will effectively be investors’ first chance to re-price AGNC after any weekend developments in rates, credit markets, or mortgage-backed securities (MBS) sentiment.
The market backdrop: year-end trading, rate cuts, and why AGNC investors care
Friday’s session (December 26) was described as light, post-holiday trading, with major U.S. indexes finishing slightly lower while still holding strong year-to-date gains. [1]
For AGNC holders, the bigger story is the interest-rate regime:
- The Federal Reserve said on December 10, 2025 that it cut the federal funds target range by 25 bps to 3.50%–3.75%. [2]
- The 10-year Treasury yield has been hovering around the low 4% area late in December (roughly 4.14% in recent readings). [3]
- Freddie Mac’s weekly survey showed the 30-year fixed mortgage rate averaged 6.18% as of December 24, 2025, down from the prior week. [4]
Why it matters: AGNC is a mortgage REIT that earns returns primarily from the spread between the yield on its mortgage assets and its hedged funding costs. A Fed that’s cutting (or expected to cut) can change funding costs, volatility, and investor demand for Agency MBS—all key inputs for AGNC’s book value and dividend coverage.
What AGNC actually owns: “agency MBS” and why that reduces one risk—but amplifies others
AGNC is structured as a mortgage REIT (mREIT). Instead of owning buildings, it owns mortgages and mortgage-backed securities and distributes substantial income to shareholders (REIT rules drive high payouts). [5]
Critically, AGNC is heavily oriented toward Agency mortgage-backed securities—which generally have government-sponsored enterprise (GSE) support (reducing credit risk relative to many other mortgage assets), but can still carry significant interest-rate risk, prepayment risk, leverage risk, and spread risk. [6]
AGNC disclosed that as of September 30, 2025, it had:
- $90.8 billion fair value of its investment portfolio (including TBA positions),
- tangible net book value (TBV) of $8.28 per share,
- and a tangible “at risk” leverage ratio of 7.6x. [7]
At around $10.85, the stock is trading at a sizable premium to that last-reported tangible book value (TBV is a moving target for mREITs, but the reference point matters for how many investors value the sector). [8]
The most recent official performance snapshot: Q3 2025 results and management commentary
From AGNC’s Q3 2025 disclosures (quarter ended September 30, 2025):
- Comprehensive income:$0.78 per common share for Q3 2025
- Economic return on tangible common equity:10.6% (driven by dividends plus TBV change)
- Liquidity:$7.2 billion of cash and unencumbered Agency MBS
- Capital actions: issuance of $345 million of 8.75% Series H preferred equity and net proceeds of $309 million from common shares sold via at-the-market offerings [9]
In AGNC’s own “Earnings Extract” commentary for Q3, CEO Peter Federico and CFO Bernice Bell emphasized a constructive view on Agency MBS supply/demand and highlighted positioning intended to benefit if rate cuts reduce funding costs. [10]
The CFO also discussed hedging posture (including a hedge ratio framework) and the idea that an easing rate environment could provide a tailwind to net spread and dollar roll income as funding costs adjust. [11]
Dividend update: what AGNC just declared and the key dates investors should know
AGNC’s board declared a $0.12 per share common dividend for December 2025, payable January 12, 2026, to shareholders of record December 31, 2025. [12]
The “ex-dividend” wrinkle in a T+1 world
Because U.S. equities now settle on T+1, the ex-dividend date and record date are generally the same for regular-way dividends. [13]
What that means in plain English for AGNC’s December dividend:
- Record date:Dec. 31, 2025 (per AGNC’s announcement) [14]
- To be on record by then, most investors would need to own shares before Dec. 31—typically by buying no later than Dec. 30 (so settlement occurs by the record/ex date). [15]
Analyst targets and fresh research: Wall Street is split between “income appeal” and “valuation risk”
Recent sell-side and market commentary on AGNC has leaned into a familiar tug-of-war:
Bullish/constructive notes (agency MBS optimism into 2026)
- Keefe, Bruyette & Woods (KBW) analyst Bose George raised AGNC’s price target to $11 from $10.50 and maintained an Outperform rating, with commentary that the firm is constructive on agency MBS REITs heading into 2026. [16]
- Piper Sandler maintained an Overweight recommendation in coverage cited in a December 22 note recap. [17]
Consensus targets (more muted upside from here)
Aggregators compiling analyst targets show a fairly tight band around the low-$10s:
- MarketBeat lists an average target around $10.39. [18]
- TipRanks shows an average target around $10.31 (with a high forecast around $11). [19]
- Zacks lists an average target around $10.25. [20]
With the stock around $10.85, that bundle of consensus estimates implies analysts, on average, see limited upside / modest downside—even while many still rate the stock as some version of “buy/overweight” because of the dividend and the potential macro setup. [21]
More cautious takes surfacing right now
- A MarketBeat item reported Wall Street Zen downgraded AGNC from “hold” to “sell” in a note dated Saturday, Dec. 27. [22]
- A Nasdaq-hosted Zacks analysis earlier noted AGNC can look expensive on price-to-book versus some peers, and highlighted ongoing sensitivity to rate volatility and spread moves. [23]
- A Seeking Alpha piece published today framed the stock as offering a “fat” yield but argued the author is not a buyer at current levels—illustrating that the debate isn’t about the yield existing; it’s about whether investors are being compensated enough for the book-value and spread risks. [24]
Insider transactions: a fact investors often check before earnings season
In late October 2025, CEO Peter J. Federico reported sales of AGNC shares under a Rule 10b5-1 plan in Form 4 filings. [25]
Insider sales don’t automatically mean anything bearish—executives sell for many reasons—but in the mREIT space (where confidence in book value and dividend durability is everything), some investors track insider activity as part of their checklist.
If you’re holding AGNC into Monday, here’s what to watch before the next session
Because it’s the weekend, you can’t react to intraday swings—but you can prepare for the variables that tend to move AGNC quickly:
- Rates and volatility signals
AGNC’s returns can swing with Treasury yields, mortgage spreads, and rate volatility. Late-December 10-year yields around the 4.1% area are part of the current setup investors are pricing. [26] - Fed path: cuts are already happening, but the “next” matters
The Fed’s December cut set the target range at 3.50%–3.75%, and the Fed’s projections materials (SEP framework) help shape expectations for 2026. [27]
AGNC’s own December Fed commentary also highlighted that policymakers see the rate as nearer “neutral” and that data limitations (from the government shutdown delays) have complicated the picture. [28]
- Dividend positioning into Dec. 31
If the dividend matters to your strategy, the key is the Dec. 31 record date and how T+1 settlement affects who qualifies. [29] - Next earnings window: late January
Nasdaq currently shows AGNC is estimated to report around January 26, 2026 (algorithm-based and subject to change). [30] - Book value risk (the real heartbeat metric for mREITs)
AGNC’s last disclosed tangible book value was $8.28 per share at Sept. 30, 2025. If rates or spreads moved sharply in Q4, that figure can change—sometimes meaningfully. [31]
Bottom line: AGNC is a macro-sensitive income stock—timing and expectations matter
AGNC’s appeal is straightforward: a high monthly dividend and exposure to an Agency MBS market that management and some analysts believe could be supported by easing policy and constructive supply/demand dynamics. [32]
The trade-off is also straightforward: the stock can behave less like a sleepy dividend payer and more like a levered rates instrument—because book value and spreads can shift quickly, and valuation relative to book becomes a battleground when the stock rallies. [33]
References
1. apnews.com, 2. www.federalreserve.gov, 3. fred.stlouisfed.org, 4. www.freddiemac.com, 5. www.fool.com, 6. www.fool.com, 7. www.sec.gov, 8. www.sec.gov, 9. www.sec.gov, 10. agnc.com, 11. agnc.com, 12. www.prnewswire.com, 13. www.dtcc.com, 14. www.prnewswire.com, 15. www.dtcc.com, 16. www.tipranks.com, 17. www.nasdaq.com, 18. www.marketbeat.com, 19. www.tipranks.com, 20. www.zacks.com, 21. www.marketbeat.com, 22. www.marketbeat.com, 23. www.nasdaq.com, 24. seekingalpha.com, 25. www.sec.gov, 26. fred.stlouisfed.org, 27. www.federalreserve.gov, 28. agnc.com, 29. www.prnewswire.com, 30. www.nasdaq.com, 31. www.sec.gov, 32. www.prnewswire.com, 33. www.sec.gov
