Raymond James Financial Inc. Acquires Shares of 377,028 Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC)

Raymond James Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The fund purchased 377,028 shares of the asset manager’s stock, valued at approximately $27,855,000.

A number of other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in MC. R Squared Ltd bought a new position in shares of Moelis & Company in the 4th quarter valued at about $47,000. Jones Financial Companies Lllp raised its position in Moelis & Company by 148.3% in the 4th quarter. Jones Financial Companies Lllp now owns 822 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $61,000 after purchasing an additional 491 shares during the period. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC raised its position in Moelis & Company by 368.2% in the 4th quarter. Smartleaf Asset Management LLC now owns 1,016 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $75,000 after purchasing an additional 799 shares during the period. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in Moelis & Company by 18.1% in the 4th quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,175 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $87,000 after purchasing an additional 180 shares during the period. Finally, Blue Trust Inc. raised its position in Moelis & Company by 47.7% in the 4th quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,597 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $109,000 after purchasing an additional 516 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 91.53% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms recently weighed in on MC. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $92.00 price objective (up from $86.00) on shares of Moelis & Company in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Morgan Stanley reissued an “underweight” rating and issued a $70.00 price objective (down from $100.00) on shares of Moelis & Company in a research report on Thursday. StockNews.com lowered shares of Moelis & Company from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday. The Goldman Sachs Group reduced their target price on shares of Moelis & Company from $86.00 to $75.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price on shares of Moelis & Company from $77.00 to $83.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, five have assigned a hold rating and one has given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $71.83.

Insider Activity at Moelis & Company

In other Moelis & Company news, insider Christopher Callesano sold 1,282 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.00, for a total value of $94,868.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 1,227 shares in the company, valued at $90,798. This trade represents a 51.10 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, CEO Kenneth Moelis sold 9,712 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.00, for a total transaction of $718,688.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 209,235 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $15,483,390. This trade represents a 4.44 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 22,721 shares of company stock valued at $1,677,017 over the last ninety days. 6.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Moelis & Company Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:MC opened at $59.61 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $4.47 billion, a PE ratio of 33.87 and a beta of 1.43. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $72.87 and its 200-day simple moving average is $71.72. Moelis & Company has a one year low of $46.24 and a one year high of $82.89.

Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 5th. The asset manager reported $1.18 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.39 by $0.79. Moelis & Company had a net margin of 11.39% and a return on equity of 38.49%. Equities research analysts predict that Moelis & Company will post 2.97 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Moelis & Company Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 27th. Investors of record on Tuesday, February 18th will be issued a dividend of $0.65 per share. This represents a $2.60 annualized dividend and a yield of 4.36%. This is a positive change from Moelis & Company’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.60. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, February 18th. Moelis & Company’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 147.73%.

About Moelis & Company

Moelis & Co operates as a holding company. It engages in the provision of financial advisory, capital raising and asset management services to a client base including corporations, governments, sovereign wealth funds and financial sponsors. The firm focuses on clients including large public multinational corporations, middle market private companies, financial sponsors, entrepreneurs and governments.