CME Group Inc. $CME Shares Acquired by Legal & General Group Plc

Legal & General Group Plc boosted its stake in shares of CME Group Inc. (NASDAQ:CME) by 1.8% in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 2,481,323 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after purchasing an additional 44,252 shares during the quarter. Legal & General Group Plc’s holdings in CME Group were worth $677,593,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in CME Group by 1.7% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 35,895,583 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $9,802,366,000 after purchasing an additional 588,509 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. boosted its position in CME Group by 2.8% during the 3rd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 4,812,914 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $1,300,450,000 after purchasing an additional 130,848 shares during the period. Sanders Capital LLC acquired a new position in CME Group during the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $1,006,932,000. Franklin Resources Inc. boosted its position in CME Group by 0.6% during the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 3,381,133 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $913,548,000 after purchasing an additional 20,213 shares during the period. Finally, Invesco Ltd. boosted its position in CME Group by 23.0% during the 3rd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 2,830,323 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $764,725,000 after acquiring an additional 528,358 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 87.75% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages have issued reports on CME. Argus reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of CME Group in a research report on Wednesday, March 4th. Morgan Stanley reduced their price target on CME Group from $362.00 to $353.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 23rd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft reduced their price target on CME Group from $342.00 to $322.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 23rd. TD Cowen reduced their price target on CME Group from $340.00 to $323.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 23rd. Finally, Weiss Ratings upgraded CME Group from a “buy (b+)” rating to a “buy (a-)” rating in a research report on Monday, March 2nd. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, eight have assigned a Buy rating, six have assigned a Hold rating and two have assigned a Sell rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $305.29.

CME Group Stock Performance

Shares of CME Group stock opened at $291.23 on Tuesday. The company has a quick ratio of 1.02, a current ratio of 1.02 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.13. The firm has a market cap of $105.53 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.85, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.52 and a beta of 0.23. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $295.98 and a 200-day simple moving average of $289.46. CME Group Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $257.17 and a fifty-two week high of $329.16.

CME Group (NASDAQ:CME) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 22nd. The financial services provider reported $3.36 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.11 by $0.25. The business had revenue of $1.88 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.77 billion. CME Group had a return on equity of 15.42% and a net margin of 63.19%.The company’s revenue was up 14.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $2.80 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts forecast that CME Group Inc. will post 12.28 EPS for the current fiscal year.

CME Group Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, June 25th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, June 9th will be issued a $1.30 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, June 9th. This represents a $5.20 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.8%. CME Group’s dividend payout ratio is 44.37%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Terrence A. Duffy sold 35,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $298.51, for a total value of $10,447,850.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 55,630 shares in the company, valued at $16,606,111.30. This represents a 38.62% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, General Counsel Jonathan L. Marcus sold 3,291 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $333.37, for a total value of $1,097,120.67. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel owned 7,192 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,397,597.04. This trade represents a 31.39% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders sold a total of 44,044 shares of company stock worth $13,297,507 over the last 90 days. 0.30% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

CME Group Profile

CME Group Inc is a global markets company that operates some of the world’s largest and most liquid derivatives exchanges, including the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME), the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and COMEX. The firm offers futures and options contracts across a broad range of asset classes — including interest rates, equity indexes, foreign exchange, energy, agricultural commodities and metals — and serves a diverse client base of institutional investors, commercial hedgers, brokers and retail participants.

The company’s core services include electronic trading on the CME Globex platform, central clearing through CME Clearing, and distribution of market data, indexes and analytics.