SmartHarvest Portfolios LLC Purchases Shares of 4,902 Morgan Stanley $MS

Key Points

• SmartHarvest Portfolios LLC opened a new position in Morgan Stanley during the fourth quarter, buying 4,902 shares valued at about $870,000.
• Morgan Stanley has seen continued support from institutional investors, with several funds increasing their stakes; overall, about 84.19% of the stock is held by institutions and hedge funds.
• Analysts remain broadly positive on the stock: recent target-price hikes lifted the average target to $205.95, while Morgan Stanley also reported strong quarterly results with EPS of $3.43 and revenue of $20.58 billion.

SmartHarvest Portfolios LLC purchased a new stake in Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS - Free Report) in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor purchased 4,902 shares of the financial services provider's stock, valued at approximately $870,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the business. Farther Finance Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Morgan Stanley by 40.1% during the 4th quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 29,744 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $5,281,000 after buying an additional 8,512 shares during the period. Bahl & Gaynor Inc. raised its holdings in Morgan Stanley by 103.1% during the 3rd quarter. Bahl & Gaynor Inc. now owns 12,700 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $2,019,000 after buying an additional 6,448 shares during the period. ABN Amro Investment Solutions raised its holdings in Morgan Stanley by 52.6% during the 3rd quarter. ABN Amro Investment Solutions now owns 113,504 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $18,043,000 after buying an additional 39,104 shares during the period. FNY Investment Advisers LLC raised its holdings in Morgan Stanley by 679.8% during the 4th quarter. FNY Investment Advisers LLC now owns 42,400 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $7,527,000 after buying an additional 36,963 shares during the period. Finally, Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH increased its holdings in shares of Morgan Stanley by 34.4% in the 3rd quarter. Siemens Fonds Invest GmbH now owns 50,012 shares of the financial services provider's stock valued at $7,950,000 after purchasing an additional 12,804 shares during the period. 84.19% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

MS has been the topic of a number of research reports. Evercore upped their target price on Morgan Stanley from $190.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday, April 16th. Erste Group Bank upgraded Morgan Stanley from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a report on Monday, April 27th. UBS Group upped their target price on Morgan Stanley from $196.00 to $214.00 in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Dbs Bank upped their target price on Morgan Stanley from $185.00 to $220.00 in a report on Thursday, May 7th. Finally, Bank of America upped their target price on Morgan Stanley from $220.00 to $225.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Thursday, April 16th. Twelve investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and twelve have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average target price of $205.95.

Morgan Stanley Price Performance

Shares of MS opened at $212.74 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $335.55 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.27, a P/E/G ratio of 1.55 and a beta of 1.23. The business's 50-day moving average is $192.77 and its 200-day moving average is $180.61. Morgan Stanley has a fifty-two week low of $128.81 and a fifty-two week high of $219.16. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 3.52, a current ratio of 0.77 and a quick ratio of 0.77.

Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 15th. The financial services provider reported $3.43 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.02 by $0.41. The business had revenue of $20.58 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $19.23 billion. Morgan Stanley had a return on equity of 17.70% and a net margin of 14.65%.The firm's quarterly revenue was up 16.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $2.60 EPS. Equities research analysts expect that Morgan Stanley will post 11.85 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Morgan Stanley Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, May 15th. Investors of record on Thursday, April 30th were paid a $1.00 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, April 30th. This represents a $4.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.9%. Morgan Stanley's payout ratio is presently 36.23%.

Key Morgan Stanley News

Here are the key news stories impacting Morgan Stanley this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Morgan Stanley is being highlighted as a likely beneficiary of a coming wave of AI-related IPOs, with reports saying the bank could earn significant underwriting, trading, and advisory fees from deals such as OpenAI, Anthropic, and SpaceX. Barrons AI IPO article
• Positive Sentiment: Another report said Morgan Stanley’s leadership is “wide awake” to M&A opportunities, with wealth management and asset management cited as areas for potential inorganic growth, which supports optimism around longer-term expansion. Morgan Stanley M&A opportunities article
• Positive Sentiment: The bank also announced it is expanding AI access on its workplace wealth platform, allowing clients’ AI agents to interact with stock-plan tools, a move that could deepen client relationships and improve the digital wealth-management offering. Morgan Stanley AI access article
• Neutral Sentiment: Additional commentary on Morgan Stanley’s role in upcoming IPO activity and broader market momentum has kept the stock in focus, but these items are more thematic than directly company-specific. Morgan Stanley IPO realities article

Insider Activity at Morgan Stanley

In related news, insider Andrew M. Saperstein sold 51,668 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, April 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $188.59, for a total value of $9,744,068.12. Following the completion of the sale, the insider owned 282,142 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $53,209,159.78. The trade was a 15.48% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Eric F. Grossman sold 11,118 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 20th. The shares were sold at an average price of $190.75, for a total value of $2,120,758.50. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 169,403 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $32,313,622.25. The trade was a 6.16% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. In the last quarter, insiders sold 77,476 shares of company stock valued at $14,644,762. 0.17% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Morgan Stanley Company Profile

Morgan Stanley NYSE: MS is a global financial services firm headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1935 by Henry S. Morgan and Harold Stanley, the company provides a broad range of investment banking, securities, wealth management and investment management services to corporations, governments, institutions and individual investors. Leadership has been guided by a senior executive team and board of directors; James P. Gorman has served as the company's chief executive and chairman in recent years.

The firm's primary business activities are organized around three principal businesses: Institutional Securities, Wealth Management and Investment Management.

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