Bellwether Advisors LLC Increases Holdings in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Bellwether Advisors LLC increased its position in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI - Free Report) by 10.7% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 12,234 shares of the technology company's stock after purchasing an additional 1,184 shares during the quarter. MSCI makes up 1.3% of Bellwether Advisors LLC's holdings, making the stock its 17th largest position. Bellwether Advisors LLC's holdings in MSCI were worth $7,341,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. raised its stake in MSCI by 30.9% in the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 174,982 shares of the technology company's stock worth $104,991,000 after purchasing an additional 41,346 shares in the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised its position in shares of MSCI by 4.5% in the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 536,211 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $312,574,000 after buying an additional 23,050 shares in the last quarter. Nvwm LLC boosted its holdings in shares of MSCI by 3,581.3% in the 4th quarter. Nvwm LLC now owns 1,767 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $1,060,000 after purchasing an additional 1,719 shares in the last quarter. Merit Financial Group LLC lifted its position in shares of MSCI by 76.3% during the 4th quarter. Merit Financial Group LLC now owns 2,992 shares of the technology company's stock worth $1,795,000 after buying an additional 1,295 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Threadgill Financial LLC boosted its stake in shares of MSCI by 255.4% in the 4th quarter. Threadgill Financial LLC now owns 1,283 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $770,000 after purchasing an additional 922 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 89.97% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

MSCI has been the subject of a number of research reports. Evercore ISI dropped their price objective on shares of MSCI from $673.00 to $631.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an "outperform" rating and issued a $675.00 price objective on shares of MSCI in a research report on Wednesday, April 16th. Barclays dropped their target price on shares of MSCI from $675.00 to $650.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, April 4th. Oppenheimer restated a "market perform" rating on shares of MSCI in a report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. reduced their price objective on shares of MSCI from $680.00 to $650.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, April 16th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $645.36.

MSCI Price Performance

NYSE:MSCI traded up $4.42 on Wednesday, reaching $544.88. 600,741 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 539,434. The firm has a market cap of $42.16 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 38.75, a P/E/G ratio of 2.61 and a beta of 1.30. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $553.60 and a 200-day simple moving average of $582.76. MSCI Inc. has a 52 week low of $458.69 and a 52 week high of $642.45.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 22nd. The technology company reported $4.00 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $3.88 by $0.12. The firm had revenue of $745.83 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $746.45 million. MSCI had a net margin of 38.83% and a negative return on equity of 156.08%. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that MSCI Inc. will post 16.86 EPS for the current year.

MSCI Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 30th. Stockholders of record on Friday, May 16th will be given a dividend of $1.80 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 16th. This represents a $7.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.32%. MSCI's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 49.48%.

Insider Transactions at MSCI

In other MSCI news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez bought 5,300 shares of MSCI stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 24th. The shares were bought at an average price of $574.51 per share, with a total value of $3,044,903.00. Following the acquisition, the chief executive officer now owns 1,269,951 shares in the company, valued at approximately $729,599,549.01. This trade represents a 0.42 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, COO Cd Baer Pettit sold 5,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Friday, April 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $524.25, for a total transaction of $2,621,250.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 294,787 shares of the company's stock, valued at $154,542,084.75. This represents a 1.67 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 3.31% of the stock is owned by insiders.

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.