Ghe LLC Acquires 583 Shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Ghe LLC raised its holdings in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) by 11.9% in the 3rd quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The fund owned 5,472 shares of the technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 583 shares during the quarter. MSCI makes up approximately 1.3% of Ghe LLC’s holdings, making the stock its 16th largest holding. Ghe LLC’s holdings in MSCI were worth $3,190,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in MSCI. Cumberland Partners Ltd bought a new stake in shares of MSCI in the 3rd quarter valued at $1,457,000. Aigen Investment Management LP bought a new stake in shares of MSCI in the 3rd quarter valued at $1,222,000. Prime Capital Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of MSCI by 30.0% in the 3rd quarter. Prime Capital Investment Advisors LLC now owns 564 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $329,000 after buying an additional 130 shares in the last quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. increased its position in shares of MSCI by 2.9% in the 3rd quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 176,205 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $102,715,000 after buying an additional 4,935 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Entropy Technologies LP increased its position in shares of MSCI by 50.3% in the 3rd quarter. Entropy Technologies LP now owns 4,790 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,792,000 after buying an additional 1,602 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of analysts recently commented on the stock. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of MSCI from $650.00 to $700.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, September 13th. Wells Fargo & Company upped their target price on shares of MSCI from $570.00 to $600.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, October 11th. Redburn Atlantic raised shares of MSCI from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $680.00 target price for the company in a research note on Wednesday, October 9th. The Goldman Sachs Group upped their target price on shares of MSCI from $526.00 to $590.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 24th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $638.00 target price on shares of MSCI in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $631.83.

MSCI Trading Up 1.2 %

Shares of MSCI stock traded up $7.14 during trading hours on Wednesday, reaching $609.78. 8,813 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 540,736. The company has a 50 day moving average of $581.48 and a two-hundred day moving average of $535.52. MSCI Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $439.95 and a fifty-two week high of $631.70. The stock has a market cap of $47.79 billion, a P/E ratio of 39.57, a P/E/G ratio of 3.10 and a beta of 1.11.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The technology company reported $3.86 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.77 by $0.09. MSCI had a net margin of 43.06% and a negative return on equity of 162.06%. The company had revenue of $724.70 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $716.15 million. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $3.45 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 15.9% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that MSCI Inc. will post 14.98 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MSCI Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 29th. Investors of record on Friday, November 15th will be paid a $1.60 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 15th. This represents a $6.40 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.05%. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 42.02%.

MSCI Profile

MSCI Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides critical decision support tools and solutions for the investment community to manage investment processes worldwide. The Index segment provides indexes for use in various areas of the investment process, including indexed financial product, such as ETFs, mutual funds, annuities, futures, options, structured products, and over-the-counter derivatives; performance benchmarking; portfolio construction and rebalancing; and asset allocation, as well as licenses GICS and GICS Direct.