California State Teachers Retirement System Sells 5,941 Shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

California State Teachers Retirement System decreased its position in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI - Free Report) by 4.6% in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 122,084 shares of the technology company's stock after selling 5,941 shares during the quarter. California State Teachers Retirement System owned about 0.16% of MSCI worth $73,252,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other large investors have also made changes to their positions in MSCI. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of MSCI by 1.9% in the fourth quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,897,456 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $1,136,563,000 after purchasing an additional 35,094 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in MSCI by 8.0% during the 4th quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,613,005 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $967,820,000 after purchasing an additional 119,471 shares during the period. Fiera Capital Corp grew its holdings in MSCI by 4.5% in the 4th quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 1,148,615 shares of the technology company's stock valued at $689,180,000 after buying an additional 49,679 shares during the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in MSCI in the 4th quarter worth approximately $609,937,000. Finally, FMR LLC lifted its holdings in shares of MSCI by 3.1% during the fourth quarter. FMR LLC now owns 853,452 shares of the technology company's stock worth $512,079,000 after buying an additional 25,325 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 89.97% of the company's stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on the company. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their target price on MSCI from $680.00 to $650.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, April 16th. Evercore ISI dropped their target price on shares of MSCI from $673.00 to $631.00 and set an "outperform" rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, April 23rd. Oppenheimer reissued a "market perform" rating on shares of MSCI in a research note on Wednesday, April 23rd. Barclays reduced 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. Finally, Bank of America started coverage on MSCI in a research report on Thursday, April 10th. They issued a "neutral" rating and a $585.00 price objective for the company. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, MSCI currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $645.36.

MSCI Stock Performance

MSCI stock traded up $9.51 during midday trading on Friday, hitting $555.58. 389,901 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 535,964. MSCI Inc. has a one year low of $466.36 and a one year high of $642.45. The company has a market cap of $42.99 billion, a PE ratio of 39.51, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.61 and a beta of 1.30. The stock's fifty day moving average price is $551.81 and its 200-day moving average price is $581.68.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 22nd. The technology company reported $4.00 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.88 by $0.12. The business had revenue of $745.83 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $746.45 million. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 156.08% and a net margin of 38.83%. On average, analysts expect that MSCI Inc. will post 16.86 EPS for the current year.

MSCI Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed 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. This represents a $7.20 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.30%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, May 16th. MSCI's dividend payout ratio is 49.48%.

Insider Buying and Selling

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