Simplicity Wealth LLC Makes New $578,000 Investment in BlackRock $BLK

Simplicity Wealth LLC purchased a new position in BlackRock (NYSE:BLK - Free Report) in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 550 shares of the asset manager's stock, valued at approximately $578,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. McLean Asset Management Corp lifted its position in shares of BlackRock by 3.9% in the second quarter. McLean Asset Management Corp now owns 266 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $285,000 after buying an additional 10 shares during the last quarter. Trust Co. of Oklahoma increased its stake in shares of BlackRock by 0.5% in the second quarter. Trust Co. of Oklahoma now owns 2,023 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $2,123,000 after purchasing an additional 10 shares during the period. TOWER TRUST & INVESTMENT Co increased its stake in shares of BlackRock by 1.3% in the second quarter. TOWER TRUST & INVESTMENT Co now owns 799 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $838,000 after purchasing an additional 10 shares during the period. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC increased its stake in shares of BlackRock by 4.7% in the second quarter. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC now owns 223 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $234,000 after purchasing an additional 10 shares during the period. Finally, Ameriflex Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of BlackRock by 8.8% in the second quarter. Ameriflex Group Inc. now owns 123 shares of the asset manager's stock worth $127,000 after purchasing an additional 10 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 80.69% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities analysts have recently commented on BLK shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on BlackRock from $1,093.00 to $1,242.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. Evercore ISI lifted their price objective on BlackRock from $1,170.00 to $1,200.00 and gave the stock an "outperform" rating in a research note on Friday, September 5th. Wells Fargo & Company dropped their price objective on BlackRock from $1,180.00 to $1,170.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research note on Wednesday, July 16th. Argus reiterated a "buy" rating on shares of BlackRock in a research note on Tuesday, July 8th. Finally, Bank of America lifted their price objective on BlackRock from $1,224.00 to $1,396.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research note on Thursday, October 2nd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirteen have issued a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, BlackRock currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $1,222.87.

BlackRock Trading Down 1.0%

Shares of BLK opened at $1,166.90 on Wednesday. BlackRock has a 12-month low of $773.74 and a 12-month high of $1,184.13. The company has a quick ratio of 4.04, a current ratio of 4.04 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39. The firm has a market capitalization of $180.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.21, a P/E/G ratio of 2.22 and a beta of 1.45. The stock's 50-day moving average price is $1,131.84 and its 200 day moving average price is $1,031.25.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, July 15th. The asset manager reported $12.05 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $10.41 by $1.64. BlackRock had a return on equity of 15.53% and a net margin of 29.68%.The firm had revenue of $5.42 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $5.40 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $10.36 earnings per share. The company's quarterly revenue was up 12.9% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that BlackRock will post 47.41 earnings per share for the current year.

BlackRock Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, September 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, September 5th were issued a dividend of $5.21 per share. This represents a $20.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 5th. BlackRock's payout ratio is presently 50.39%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other BlackRock news, Director Rachel Lord sold 18,036 shares of BlackRock stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $1,125.60, for a total transaction of $20,301,321.60. Following the sale, the director directly owned 19,205 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $21,617,148. The trade was a 48.43% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Laurence Fink sold 12,054 shares of BlackRock stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, July 25th. The shares were sold at an average price of $1,125.43, for a total value of $13,565,933.22. Following the sale, the chief executive officer directly owned 251,697 shares in the company, valued at $283,267,354.71. The trade was a 4.57% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 66,494 shares of company stock valued at $74,694,573 over the last ninety days. Company insiders own 1.98% of the company's stock.

BlackRock Profile

BlackRock, Inc is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks.

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