Schroder Investment Management Group Has $262.69 Million Stock Position in Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK)

Schroder Investment Management Group raised its stake in Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK) by 3.8% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 953,753 shares of the business services provider’s stock after buying an additional 34,826 shares during the quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group’s holdings in Verisk Analytics were worth $262,692,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Dorsey & Whitney Trust CO LLC increased its position in Verisk Analytics by 3.1% during the 4th quarter. Dorsey & Whitney Trust CO LLC now owns 1,213 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $334,000 after buying an additional 37 shares during the period. Ascent Group LLC increased its position in Verisk Analytics by 1.7% during the third quarter. Ascent Group LLC now owns 2,508 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $672,000 after acquiring an additional 43 shares during the period. Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB raised its stake in Verisk Analytics by 5.0% in the 4th quarter. Wilmington Savings Fund Society FSB now owns 897 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $247,000 after purchasing an additional 43 shares in the last quarter. Rehmann Capital Advisory Group boosted its holdings in Verisk Analytics by 4.8% in the 3rd quarter. Rehmann Capital Advisory Group now owns 974 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $264,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares during the period. Finally, Bell Bank increased its holdings in shares of Verisk Analytics by 4.7% during the fourth quarter. Bell Bank now owns 1,005 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $277,000 after purchasing an additional 45 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.00% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

VRSK has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price objective on Verisk Analytics from $325.00 to $321.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Morgan Stanley boosted their price target on Verisk Analytics from $283.00 to $300.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 12th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price objective on shares of Verisk Analytics from $280.00 to $297.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 27th. Robert W. Baird boosted their target price on shares of Verisk Analytics from $298.00 to $320.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $300.00 price target on shares of Verisk Analytics in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $299.33.

Verisk Analytics Stock Performance

Shares of Verisk Analytics stock opened at $294.58 on Friday. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $290.81 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $281.39. The firm has a market capitalization of $41.32 billion, a P/E ratio of 45.96, a P/E/G ratio of 3.37 and a beta of 0.89. Verisk Analytics, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $217.34 and a fifty-two week high of $306.10. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 8.36, a current ratio of 0.82 and a quick ratio of 0.82.

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 26th. The business services provider reported $1.61 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.60 by $0.01. The company had revenue of $735.60 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $733.55 million. Verisk Analytics had a return on equity of 274.13% and a net margin of 32.65%. On average, equities analysts forecast that Verisk Analytics, Inc. will post 6.63 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Verisk Analytics Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, March 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 14th will be issued a dividend of $0.45 per share. This is a boost from Verisk Analytics’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.39. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.61%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 14th. Verisk Analytics’s payout ratio is 26.87%.

Verisk Analytics announced that its Board of Directors has approved a stock buyback plan on Wednesday, February 26th that authorizes the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the business services provider to purchase up to 2.5% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock repurchase plans are usually a sign that the company’s board of directors believes its stock is undervalued.

Insider Activity

In other Verisk Analytics news, Director Bruce Edward Hansen sold 1,179 shares of Verisk Analytics stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $294.95, for a total transaction of $347,746.05. Following the transaction, the director now directly owns 13,786 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $4,066,180.70. The trade was a 7.88 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Kathy Card Beckles sold 2,111 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $282.06, for a total value of $595,428.66. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 9,066 shares in the company, valued at $2,557,155.96. This trade represents a 18.89 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 5,648 shares of company stock valued at $1,613,047 over the last quarter. 0.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Verisk Analytics Company Profile

Verisk Analytics, Inc provides data analytics and technology solutions to the insurance markets in the United States and internationally. It offers policy language, prospective loss costs, policy writing and rating rules, and various underwriting solutions for risk selection and segmentation, pricing, and workflow optimization; property- and auto- specific rating and underwriting information solutions that allows clients to understand, quantify, underwrite, mitigate, and avoid potential loss for risks; catastrophe modeling solutions, which enables companies to identify, quantify, and plan for the financial consequences of catastrophes for use by insurers, reinsurers, intermediaries, financial institutions, and governments.