St. Louis Trust Co Takes Position in MSCI Inc $MSCI

St. Louis Trust Co acquired a new stake in shares of MSCI Inc (NYSE:MSCI) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm acquired 1,564 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $897,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Principal Financial Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 6.6% in the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,777,749 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,008,745,000 after buying an additional 109,287 shares during the last quarter. Katamaran Capital LLP increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 57.1% in the third quarter. Katamaran Capital LLP now owns 4,919 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $2,791,000 after buying an additional 1,788 shares during the last quarter. Dash Acquisitions Inc. increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 103.6% in the third quarter. Dash Acquisitions Inc. now owns 14,958 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $8,490,000 after buying an additional 7,613 shares during the last quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 37.7% in the third quarter. Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. now owns 12,228 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $6,938,000 after buying an additional 3,346 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Oppenheimer Asset Management Inc. increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 10.5% in the third quarter. Oppenheimer Asset Management Inc. now owns 36,996 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $20,992,000 after buying an additional 3,510 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at MSCI

In other MSCI news, CFO Andrew C. Wiechmann sold 450 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $560.00, for a total transaction of $252,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer owned 22,544 shares in the company, valued at $12,624,640. The trade was a 1.96% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, insider Alvise J. Munari sold 10,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, April 24th. The shares were sold at an average price of $592.04, for a total transaction of $5,920,400.00. Following the sale, the insider owned 23,548 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $13,941,357.92. The trade was a 29.81% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. 3.76% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of analysts recently issued reports on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on shares of MSCI from $545.00 to $650.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 22nd. Raymond James Financial restated a “strong-buy” rating and issued a $730.00 price target on shares of MSCI in a research note on Tuesday, April 21st. Weiss Ratings upgraded shares of MSCI from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “buy (b-)” rating in a research note on Monday, May 18th. Barclays restated an “overweight” rating on shares of MSCI in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their price target on shares of MSCI from $710.00 to $720.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 22nd. One analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have issued a Buy rating and one has issued a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Buy” and a consensus price target of $692.70.

MSCI Price Performance

MSCI stock opened at $588.97 on Friday. MSCI Inc has a 1-year low of $501.08 and a 1-year high of $626.28. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $564.26 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $566.08. The firm has a market cap of $42.88 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.64, a PEG ratio of 2.22 and a beta of 1.24.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, April 21st. The technology company reported $4.55 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.38 by $0.17. MSCI had a net margin of 40.74% and a negative return on equity of 65.48%. The firm had revenue of $850.80 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $830.91 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $4.00 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.1% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that MSCI Inc will post 19.62 EPS for the current fiscal year.

MSCI Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 29th. Shareholders of record on Friday, May 15th will be paid a dividend of $2.05 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, May 15th. This represents a $8.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.4%. MSCI’s payout ratio is presently 46.83%.

About MSCI

MSCI Inc is a global provider of investment decision support tools and services for the financial industry. The company is best known for its family of market indexes, which are widely used as benchmarks by asset managers and as the basis for exchange-traded funds and other passive products. In addition to index construction and licensing, MSCI offers portfolio analytics, risk models, factor and performance attribution tools, and a suite of data and technology solutions designed to support portfolio management and trading.

Beyond traditional indexing and risk analytics, MSCI has expanded into environmental, social and governance (ESG) research and ratings, offering data, scores and screening tools that help investors integrate sustainability considerations into investment processes.