PUREfi Wealth LLC Acquires New Position in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

PUREfi Wealth LLC acquired a new stake in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 536 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $322,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in MSCI. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC grew its position in MSCI by 23.5% in the third quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 941 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $549,000 after acquiring an additional 179 shares in the last quarter. CX Institutional acquired a new position in shares of MSCI during the 3rd quarter worth $224,000. Creative Planning increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 15.6% during the 3rd quarter. Creative Planning now owns 11,090 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $6,465,000 after purchasing an additional 1,499 shares during the last quarter. NBC Securities Inc. increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 50.6% during the 3rd quarter. NBC Securities Inc. now owns 953 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $555,000 after purchasing an additional 320 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd increased its stake in shares of MSCI by 6.7% during the 3rd quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd now owns 17,538 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $10,223,000 after purchasing an additional 1,107 shares during the last quarter. 89.97% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have recently commented on MSCI. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and set a $675.00 price target on shares of MSCI in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price target on shares of MSCI from $700.00 to $680.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of MSCI from $662.00 to $695.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 12th. UBS Group decreased their price objective on shares of MSCI from $695.00 to $680.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Wolfe Research raised shares of MSCI from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 12th. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $649.23.

Insider Transactions at MSCI

In other MSCI news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez acquired 2,900 shares of MSCI stock in a transaction dated Thursday, December 5th. The stock was bought at an average cost of $612.80 per share, with a total value of $1,777,120.00. Following the acquisition, the chief executive officer now owns 330,379 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $202,456,251.20. The trade was a 0.89 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. 3.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

MSCI Price Performance

Shares of MSCI stock opened at $572.78 on Friday. MSCI Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $439.95 and a fifty-two week high of $642.45. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $602.42 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $586.05. The company has a market cap of $44.89 billion, a PE ratio of 40.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.67 and a beta of 1.11.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The technology company reported $4.18 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.96 by $0.22. MSCI had a net margin of 38.83% and a negative return on equity of 156.08%. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $3.68 earnings per share. Analysts expect that MSCI Inc. will post 16.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MSCI Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 28th. Shareholders of record on Friday, February 14th will be issued a $1.80 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 14th. This is an increase from MSCI’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.60. This represents a $7.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.26%. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is 45.52%.

About MSCI

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.