Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio Lowers Stake in MKS Inc. $MKSI

Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio cut its holdings in shares of MKS Inc. (NASDAQ:MKSI) by 32.2% during the first quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 37,486 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock after selling 17,833 shares during the period. Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio’s holdings in MKS were worth $8,615,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Blue Trust Inc. raised its holdings in MKS by 1.1% in the 1st quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 4,274 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock worth $982,000 after purchasing an additional 47 shares during the period. Covestor Ltd grew its holdings in MKS by 14.7% in the fourth quarter. Covestor Ltd now owns 390 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $63,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares during the period. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. grew its holdings in MKS by 10.4% in the fourth quarter. Daiwa Securities Group Inc. now owns 530 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $85,000 after purchasing an additional 50 shares during the period. Quadrant Capital Group LLC increased its position in shares of MKS by 1.3% in the fourth quarter. Quadrant Capital Group LLC now owns 4,335 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $693,000 after buying an additional 55 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Northwestern Mutual Investment Management Company LLC increased its position in shares of MKS by 0.4% in the fourth quarter. Northwestern Mutual Investment Management Company LLC now owns 15,028 shares of the scientific and technical instruments company’s stock valued at $2,401,000 after buying an additional 58 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.79% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research analysts have recently issued reports on MKSI shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on MKS from $305.00 to $365.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, May 8th. Bank of America boosted their price target on shares of MKS from $380.00 to $500.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Tuesday, June 23rd. KeyCorp upped their price objective on shares of MKS from $360.00 to $475.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, June 29th. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of MKS from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a report on Saturday, May 23rd. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $380.00 target price on shares of MKS in a research report on Friday, May 8th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twelve have given a Buy rating, two have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $385.00.

Insider Buying and Selling at MKS

In other news, EVP David Philip Henry sold 2,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $330.50, for a total transaction of $826,250.00. Following the completion of the sale, the executive vice president owned 16,341 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,400,700.50. This represents a 13.27% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this hyperlink. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CAO Michelle M. Mccarthy sold 2,434 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, June 5th. The shares were sold at an average price of $315.23, for a total transaction of $767,269.82. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer owned 2 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $630.46. This trade represents a 99.92% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 53,949 shares of company stock valued at $17,446,108. 0.57% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

MKS Stock Performance

NASDAQ MKSI opened at $315.70 on Tuesday. The company has a market cap of $21.32 billion, a PE ratio of 66.05, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 0.94 and a beta of 1.93. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $351.71 and its 200-day simple moving average is $283.07. MKS Inc. has a 1-year low of $88.49 and a 1-year high of $447.62. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.94, a current ratio of 1.11 and a quick ratio of 0.70.

MKS (NASDAQ:MKSI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, May 6th. The scientific and technical instruments company reported $2.30 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.00 by $0.30. MKS had a return on equity of 21.49% and a net margin of 8.06%.The firm had revenue of $1.08 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.05 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.71 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.2% on a year-over-year basis. MKS has set its Q2 2026 guidance at 2.600-3.200 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that MKS Inc. will post 11.77 EPS for the current fiscal year.

MKS Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, June 12th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, June 3rd were paid a dividend of $0.25 per share. This represents a $1.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, June 3rd. MKS’s payout ratio is 20.92%.

MKS Profile

MKS Instruments, Inc (NASDAQ: MKSI) designs, manufactures and markets technology solutions that enable advanced processes in a variety of high‐technology and industrial markets. The company’s core offerings include vacuum and gas delivery systems, pressure and flow measurement instruments, optical metrology tools, photonics subsystems and critical components for manufacturing processes. These products support the precise control and monitoring needs of semiconductor, industrial manufacturing, life and health sciences, and research applications.

The company’s product portfolio features mass flow controllers, pressure transducers, vacuum gauges, gas purity monitors, laser-based metrology systems and photonic devices such as lasers and detectors.