Private Advisory Group LLC Acquires Shares of 19,507 StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP)

Private Advisory Group LLC bought a new position in StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP) during the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm bought 19,507 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,109,000.

Several other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. American International Group Inc. increased its stake in StepStone Group by 1.2% in the 1st quarter. American International Group Inc. now owns 27,152 shares of the company’s stock worth $970,000 after acquiring an additional 322 shares during the last quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its stake in StepStone Group by 291.1% in the 3rd quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 618 shares of the company’s stock worth $35,000 after buying an additional 460 shares in the last quarter. CWM LLC increased its holdings in shares of StepStone Group by 190.4% in the 3rd quarter. CWM LLC now owns 1,185 shares of the company’s stock worth $67,000 after buying an additional 777 shares during the last quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of StepStone Group by 10.8% during the 1st quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 9,898 shares of the company’s stock worth $354,000 after acquiring an additional 963 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Lazard Asset Management LLC increased its stake in StepStone Group by 0.4% in the first quarter. Lazard Asset Management LLC now owns 288,459 shares of the company’s stock valued at $10,309,000 after acquiring an additional 1,061 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 55.54% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities analysts have recently issued reports on STEP shares. Barclays upped their price objective on StepStone Group from $51.00 to $61.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on StepStone Group from $51.50 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $56.00 to $61.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 1st. Evercore ISI upped their price objective on shares of StepStone Group from $41.00 to $48.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, July 15th. Finally, UBS Group lifted their target price on shares of StepStone Group from $44.00 to $55.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, August 21st. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $49.44.

StepStone Group Trading Down 1.3 %

STEP stock opened at $59.60 on Friday. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $53.94 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $45.67. The stock has a market capitalization of $6.59 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 78.42 and a beta of 1.28. StepStone Group LP has a 12-month low of $25.06 and a 12-month high of $61.39.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, August 8th. The company reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.35 by $0.13. The business had revenue of $186.40 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $181.15 million. StepStone Group’s revenue was up 4.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $0.26 EPS. Equities analysts predict that StepStone Group LP will post 1.83 EPS for the current year.

StepStone Group Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 13th. Shareholders of record on Friday, August 30th were given a dividend of $0.24 per share. This represents a $0.96 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.61%. This is a boost from StepStone Group’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. The ex-dividend date was Friday, August 30th. StepStone Group’s payout ratio is presently 126.32%.

About StepStone Group

StepStone Group LP. is an investment firm specializing in direct, fund of funds, secondary direct, and secondary indirect investments. For direct investment, it seeks to invest in venture debt, incubation, mezzanine, distressed/vulture, seed/startup, early venture, mid venture, late venture, emerging growth, later stage, turnaround, growth capital, industry consolidation, recapitalization, private equity and buyout investments in mature and middle market companies.