Ignite Planners LLC Takes Position in Moody’s Corporation $MCO

Ignite Planners LLC acquired a new stake in Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO) during the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor acquired 434 shares of the business services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $217,000.

A number of other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of MCO. Farther Finance Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Moody’s by 12.1% in the 1st quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 1,780 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $834,000 after purchasing an additional 192 shares during the last quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Moody’s in the 1st quarter valued at $1,413,000. GAMMA Investing LLC boosted its stake in shares of Moody’s by 20.1% in the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,724 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $803,000 after purchasing an additional 288 shares during the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its stake in shares of Moody’s by 74.8% in the 1st quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 138,472 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $64,485,000 after purchasing an additional 59,238 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Simon Quick Advisors LLC boosted its stake in shares of Moody’s by 51.0% in the 1st quarter. Simon Quick Advisors LLC now owns 921 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $429,000 after purchasing an additional 311 shares during the last quarter. 92.11% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on the stock. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Moody’s from $525.00 to $552.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 24th. Mizuho boosted their target price on shares of Moody’s from $496.00 to $532.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, July 25th. Morgan Stanley set a $520.00 target price on shares of Moody’s in a research report on Thursday. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Moody’s from $520.00 to $580.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, July 24th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reiterated a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of Moody’s in a research report on Wednesday. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eleven have given a Buy rating and five have issued a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Moody’s has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $542.79.

Moody’s Stock Performance

MCO opened at $491.77 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.75, a quick ratio of 1.75 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.70. The company’s fifty day moving average price is $501.63 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $482.44. Moody’s Corporation has a 1-year low of $378.71 and a 1-year high of $531.93. The company has a market cap of $88.03 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 41.78, a PEG ratio of 3.03 and a beta of 1.41.

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 23rd. The business services provider reported $3.56 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.39 by $0.17. Moody’s had a net margin of 29.18% and a return on equity of 60.73%. The firm had revenue of $1.90 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.82 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $3.28 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 4.5% on a year-over-year basis. Moody’s has set its FY 2025 guidance at 13.500-14.000 EPS. On average, analysts expect that Moody’s Corporation will post 13.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Moody’s Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 5th. Stockholders of record on Friday, August 15th were issued a $0.94 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 15th. This represents a $3.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.8%. Moody’s’s dividend payout ratio is currently 31.95%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CFO Noemie Clemence Heuland sold 897 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, July 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $508.24, for a total value of $455,891.28. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer owned 2,148 shares in the company, valued at $1,091,699.52. This represents a 29.46% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Stephen T. Tulenko sold 2,120 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $511.18, for a total transaction of $1,083,701.60. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 5,558 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,841,138.44. This represents a 27.61% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 9,423 shares of company stock valued at $4,812,135 over the last 90 days. 0.14% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Moody’s Profile

Moody’s Corporation operates as an integrated risk assessment firm worldwide. It operates in two segments, Moody’s Analytics and Moody’s Investors Services. The Moody’s Analytics segment develops a range of products and services that support the risk management activities of institutional participants in financial markets.