Principal Securities Inc. Buys Shares of 844 MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Principal Securities Inc. purchased a new position in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm purchased 844 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $478,000.

Several other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of MSCI. Optiver Holding B.V. bought a new stake in shares of MSCI in the third quarter valued at approximately $26,000. ORG Partners LLC boosted its holdings in shares of MSCI by 5,600.0% in the third quarter. ORG Partners LLC now owns 57 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $29,000 after acquiring an additional 56 shares during the period. Headinvest LLC bought a new stake in shares of MSCI during the 3rd quarter valued at $30,000. Annis Gardner Whiting Capital Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in MSCI during the 3rd quarter worth about $51,000. Finally, Quent Capital LLC boosted its stake in MSCI by 23.5% in the 4th quarter. Quent Capital LLC now owns 100 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $57,000 after purchasing an additional 19 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have recently commented on MSCI. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on shares of MSCI from $615.00 to $660.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Wednesday, January 31st. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on MSCI from $671.00 to $615.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 24th. StockNews.com lowered MSCI from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 20th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft upgraded MSCI from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and dropped their price target for the company from $613.00 to $569.00 in a research report on Wednesday, April 24th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $638.00 target price on shares of MSCI in a research note on Friday, April 12th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have issued a hold rating and ten have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $570.53.

MSCI Trading Up 0.5 %

MSCI opened at $488.09 on Wednesday. MSCI Inc. has a 12 month low of $439.95 and a 12 month high of $617.39. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $522.19 and its 200-day moving average price is $536.07. The company has a market cap of $38.67 billion, a P/E ratio of 33.32, a P/E/G ratio of 2.51 and a beta of 1.09.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 23rd. The technology company reported $3.52 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.44 by $0.08. The business had revenue of $680.00 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $685.47 million. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 121.86% and a net margin of 44.55%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 14.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $3.14 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that MSCI Inc. will post 14.66 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MSCI Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 31st. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 17th will be given a dividend of $1.60 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, May 16th. This represents a $6.40 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.31%. MSCI’s payout ratio is currently 43.69%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, COO Cd Baer Pettit acquired 7,500 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 25th. The stock was purchased at an average cost of $459.41 per share, with a total value of $3,445,575.00. Following the completion of the purchase, the chief operating officer now owns 291,038 shares in the company, valued at approximately $133,705,767.58. The purchase was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. In other MSCI news, COO Cd Baer Pettit bought 7,500 shares of MSCI stock in a transaction dated Thursday, April 25th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $459.41 per share, with a total value of $3,445,575.00. Following the completion of the purchase, the chief operating officer now owns 291,038 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $133,705,767.58. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, insider Scott A. Crum sold 9,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, April 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $471.69, for a total value of $4,245,210.00. Following the transaction, the insider now owns 12,831 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $6,052,254.39. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 3.20% of the company’s stock.

About MSCI

MSCI Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides critical decision support tools and solutions for the investment community to manage investment processes worldwide. The Index segment provides indexes for use in various areas of the investment process, including indexed financial product, such as ETFs, mutual funds, annuities, futures, options, structured products, and over-the-counter derivatives; performance benchmarking; portfolio construction and rebalancing; and asset allocation, as well as licenses GICS and GICS Direct.