Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. Invests $56,000 in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX)

Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. bought a new position in shares of MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund bought 257 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $56,000.

Other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. Keybank National Association OH grew its position in shares of MarketAxess by 18.2% during the 4th quarter. Keybank National Association OH now owns 8,149 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $1,842,000 after buying an additional 1,256 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of MarketAxess by 1.4% during the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 363,224 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $82,103,000 after purchasing an additional 5,153 shares in the last quarter. Norden Group LLC bought a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 4th quarter valued at about $539,000. Taika Capital LP bought a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 4th quarter valued at about $2,689,000. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 4th quarter valued at about $46,079,000. 99.01% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

MKTX has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Bank of America lifted their price objective on MarketAxess from $189.00 to $191.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Wednesday, April 2nd. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lifted their price objective on MarketAxess from $223.00 to $226.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Thursday, May 8th. UBS Group cut their price objective on MarketAxess from $305.00 to $295.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, April 7th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on MarketAxess from $263.00 to $283.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, May 8th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on MarketAxess from $232.00 to $240.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday, May 8th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $241.78.

MarketAxess Stock Performance

NASDAQ MKTX opened at $225.25 on Monday. The stock has a market capitalization of $8.45 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.98, a PEG ratio of 3.89 and a beta of 0.84. The stock’s 50 day moving average price is $219.79 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $218.06. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a 52 week low of $186.84 and a 52 week high of $296.68.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, May 7th. The financial services provider reported $1.87 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.82 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $208.58 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $211.81 million. MarketAxess had a return on equity of 20.23% and a net margin of 33.56%. The business’s quarterly revenue was down .8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.92 EPS. On average, equities research analysts forecast that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 7.79 EPS for the current year.

MarketAxess Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 4th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, May 21st were issued a $0.76 dividend. This represents a $3.04 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.35%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, May 21st. MarketAxess’s payout ratio is presently 52.87%.

About MarketAxess

MarketAxess Holdings Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates an electronic trading platform for institutional investor and broker-dealer companies worldwide. The company offers trading technology that provides liquidity access in U.S. high-grade bonds, U.S. high-yield bonds, emerging market debt, eurobonds, municipal bonds, U.S.