Artisan Partners Asset Management Inc. (NYSE:APAM) Given Average Recommendation of “Moderate Buy” by Analysts

Artisan Partners Asset Management Inc. (NYSE:APAM) has been given an average rating of “Moderate Buy” by the seven ratings firms that are currently covering the company, Marketbeat.com reports. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, two have assigned a buy recommendation and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. The average 12 month price target among analysts that have issued a report on the stock in the last year is $44.25.

A number of equities research analysts recently commented on APAM shares. TD Cowen lowered their price objective on shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management from $47.00 to $43.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, September 15th. Zacks Research raised Artisan Partners Asset Management from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 30th. Evercore ISI increased their target price on Artisan Partners Asset Management from $43.00 to $44.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a report on Thursday, October 30th. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management in a research report on Tuesday, November 11th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada upped their price objective on Artisan Partners Asset Management from $50.00 to $51.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 31st.

Artisan Partners Asset Management Price Performance

Shares of NYSE APAM opened at $42.27 on Monday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a current ratio of 1.02 and a quick ratio of 1.02. The company has a market cap of $3.41 billion, a PE ratio of 11.55 and a beta of 1.74. Artisan Partners Asset Management has a 1-year low of $32.75 and a 1-year high of $49.54. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $44.25 and a 200 day moving average price of $44.26.

Artisan Partners Asset Management (NYSE:APAM) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 28th. The asset manager reported $1.02 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.97 by $0.05. Artisan Partners Asset Management had a return on equity of 72.15% and a net margin of 22.90%.The firm had revenue of $301.29 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $300.90 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $0.92 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.8% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts forecast that Artisan Partners Asset Management will post 3.6 EPS for the current year.

Artisan Partners Asset Management Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, November 14th will be issued a $0.88 dividend. This is a positive change from Artisan Partners Asset Management’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.73. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 14th. This represents a $3.52 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 8.3%. Artisan Partners Asset Management’s payout ratio is currently 96.17%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Artisan Partners Asset Management

A number of institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of APAM. CWM LLC lifted its stake in shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management by 77.0% during the first quarter. CWM LLC now owns 2,126 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $83,000 after buying an additional 925 shares during the period. Victory Capital Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management by 3.3% during the 1st quarter. Victory Capital Management Inc. now owns 1,228,743 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $48,044,000 after purchasing an additional 39,578 shares during the period. Allianz Asset Management GmbH lifted its stake in shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management by 6.1% during the 1st quarter. Allianz Asset Management GmbH now owns 80,412 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $3,144,000 after purchasing an additional 4,593 shares during the period. Universal Beteiligungs und Servicegesellschaft mbH acquired a new stake in shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management during the first quarter worth $2,045,000. Finally, Burney Co. purchased a new stake in shares of Artisan Partners Asset Management in the first quarter valued at $562,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 86.45% of the company’s stock.

Artisan Partners Asset Management Company Profile

Artisan Partners Asset Management Inc is publicly owned investment manager. It provides its services to pension and profit sharing plans, trusts, endowments, foundations, charitable organizations, government entities, private funds and non-U.S. funds, as well as mutual funds, non-U.S. funds and collective trusts.