IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX) Short Interest Up 69.5% in September

IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX) was the recipient of a significant increase in short interest in September. As of September 30th, there was short interest totalling 1,320,000 shares, an increase of 69.5% from the September 15th total of 778,600 shares. Approximately 1.8% of the shares of the stock are short sold. Based on an average trading volume of 562,100 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 2.3 days.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On IDEX

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. UMB Bank n.a. grew its position in IDEX by 31.0% in the second quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 241 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $48,000 after acquiring an additional 57 shares in the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC increased its position in IDEX by 19.9% during the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 344 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $72,000 after buying an additional 57 shares during the last quarter. Whittier Trust Co. raised its holdings in IDEX by 38.4% during the second quarter. Whittier Trust Co. now owns 209 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $42,000 after buying an additional 58 shares in the last quarter. Czech National Bank lifted its position in shares of IDEX by 0.5% in the first quarter. Czech National Bank now owns 13,306 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $3,247,000 after buying an additional 61 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Oregon Public Employees Retirement Fund boosted its stake in shares of IDEX by 1.0% during the 2nd quarter. Oregon Public Employees Retirement Fund now owns 6,476 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,303,000 after acquiring an additional 61 shares in the last quarter. 97.96% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on IEX shares. TD Cowen lowered their price objective on shares of IDEX from $240.00 to $230.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, August 7th. Oppenheimer dropped their price target on IDEX from $245.00 to $238.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, August 5th. Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price objective on IDEX from $265.00 to $236.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, July 18th. Robert W. Baird reduced their target price on IDEX from $256.00 to $241.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a report on Friday, August 2nd. Finally, StockNews.com cut IDEX from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 11th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $238.29.

IDEX Stock Up 0.6 %

NYSE IEX traded up $1.32 during trading on Monday, reaching $212.81. 75,325 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 464,329. The company has a current ratio of 3.41, a quick ratio of 2.52 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.36. IDEX has a fifty-two week low of $183.76 and a fifty-two week high of $246.36. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $202.97 and its 200-day simple moving average is $210.27. The firm has a market capitalization of $16.11 billion, a PE ratio of 27.83, a P/E/G ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.95.

IDEX (NYSE:IEX) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 31st. The industrial products company reported $2.06 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.04 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $807.20 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $828.15 million. IDEX had a net margin of 18.19% and a return on equity of 16.87%. The firm’s revenue was down 4.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $2.18 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts predict that IDEX will post 7.88 EPS for the current year.

IDEX Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, October 25th. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 11th will be paid a $0.69 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, October 11th. This represents a $2.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.30%. IDEX’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 36.32%.

IDEX Company Profile

IDEX Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides applied solutions worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Fluid & Metering Technologies (FMT), Health & Science Technologies (HST), and Fire & Safety/Diversified Products (FSDP). The FMT segment designs, produces, and distributes positive displacement pumps, valves, small volume provers, flow meters, injectors, and other fluid-handling pump modules and systems, as well as flow monitoring and other services for the food, chemical, general industrial, water and wastewater, agricultural, and energy industries.