Wells Fargo & Company Cuts MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) Price Target to $685.00

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) had its price target trimmed by Wells Fargo & Company from $690.00 to $685.00 in a research note released on Tuesday morning,Benzinga reports. The firm currently has an overweight rating on the technology company’s stock.

Several other brokerages also recently commented on MSCI. Weiss Ratings downgraded MSCI from a “buy (b)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 30th. Raymond James Financial increased their price objective on MSCI from $730.00 to $760.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 8th. Evercore set a $722.00 price objective on shares of MSCI in a research note on Wednesday, July 22nd. Morgan Stanley reaffirmed an “overweight” rating and set a $700.00 target price on shares of MSCI in a research report on Tuesday, July 21st. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of MSCI from $700.00 to $742.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, July 20th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating and eleven have given a Buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus target price of $709.08.

MSCI Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:MSCI opened at $545.35 on Tuesday. The stock’s 50-day moving average is $561.47 and its 200-day moving average is $574.42. The company has a market cap of $39.65 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.83, a P/E/G ratio of 2.05 and a beta of 1.24. MSCI has a 52-week low of $501.08 and a 52-week high of $644.77.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, July 21st. The technology company reported $4.94 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $4.99 by ($0.05). MSCI had a negative return on equity of 55.19% and a net margin of 40.74%.The business had revenue of $867.00 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $870.71 million. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $4.17 EPS. MSCI’s revenue for the quarter was up 12.2% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities analysts predict that MSCI will post 19.61 EPS for the current year.

MSCI Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, August 28th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 14th were issued a $2.05 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 14th. This represents a $8.20 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.5%. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is presently 44.86%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On MSCI

Institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Burkett Financial Services LLC boosted its position in MSCI by 200.0% in the third quarter. Burkett Financial Services LLC now owns 48 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $26,000 after buying an additional 32 shares in the last quarter. QRG Capital Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of MSCI by 13.1% during the second quarter. QRG Capital Management Inc. now owns 2,007 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,124,000 after buying an additional 233 shares in the last quarter. Andra AP fonden increased its holdings in shares of MSCI by 477.6% during the second quarter. Andra AP fonden now owns 15,480 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $8,669,000 after buying an additional 12,800 shares in the last quarter. Junto Capital Management LP raised its stake in shares of MSCI by 128.9% in the second quarter. Junto Capital Management LP now owns 214,134 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $119,924,000 after acquiring an additional 120,584 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC raised its stake in shares of MSCI by 4.1% in the second quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 2,835 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $1,588,000 after acquiring an additional 111 shares during the last quarter. 89.97% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About MSCI

MSCI Inc is a global provider of investment decision-support tools and services for institutional investors, asset managers, banks, wealth managers and other financial professionals. The company is best known for its equity, fixed-income and multi-asset-class indexes, which are used as benchmarks and as the basis for investment products such as exchange-traded funds and other index-linked strategies.

In addition to indexes, MSCI provides portfolio analytics, risk-management and performance-measurement tools designed to help clients evaluate exposures, construct portfolios and manage investment risks.