Sovereign s Capital Management LLC Buys Shares of 2,009 IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX)

Sovereign s Capital Management LLC purchased a new stake in IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The firm purchased 2,009 shares of the industrial products company's stock, valued at approximately $420,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP increased its holdings in shares of IDEX by 13.0% in the 4th quarter. Dimensional Fund Advisors LP now owns 640,717 shares of the industrial products company's stock valued at $134,096,000 after acquiring an additional 73,540 shares during the period. Snyder Capital Management L P grew its stake in IDEX by 12.2% during the 4th quarter. Snyder Capital Management L P now owns 480,193 shares of the industrial products company's stock worth $100,500,000 after buying an additional 52,259 shares during the last quarter. Asset Management One Co. Ltd. grew its stake in IDEX by 4.2% during the 4th quarter. Asset Management One Co. Ltd. now owns 30,250 shares of the industrial products company's stock worth $6,386,000 after buying an additional 1,209 shares during the last quarter. Assetmark Inc. grew its stake in IDEX by 129.1% during the 4th quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 417 shares of the industrial products company's stock worth $87,000 after buying an additional 235 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Barclays PLC grew its stake in IDEX by 1.2% during the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,177,645 shares of the industrial products company's stock worth $252,603,000 after buying an additional 14,360 shares during the last quarter. 97.96% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

IEX has been the topic of several research analyst reports. Citigroup dropped their target price on IDEX from $264.00 to $201.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, April 14th. Mizuho set a $185.00 target price on IDEX in a research note on Friday, May 16th. Robert W. Baird set a $215.00 price target on IDEX in a research report on Friday, May 2nd. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price objective on IDEX from $206.00 to $208.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a report on Friday, May 2nd. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on IDEX from $192.00 to $208.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Friday, May 2nd. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, IDEX has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus price target of $212.50.

IDEX Stock Performance

Shares of IEX stock traded up $0.04 on Thursday, hitting $181.20. The company had a trading volume of 468,920 shares, compared to its average volume of 583,793. The firm has a market cap of $13.69 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.25, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.98 and a beta of 1.07. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $177.05 and a 200-day moving average price of $200.16. The company has a quick ratio of 1.85, a current ratio of 2.53 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49. IDEX Co. has a twelve month low of $153.36 and a twelve month high of $238.22.

IDEX (NYSE:IEX - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The industrial products company reported $1.75 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $1.64 by $0.11. The company had revenue of $814.30 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $807.25 million. IDEX had a return on equity of 16.08% and a net margin of 15.45%. IDEX's quarterly revenue was up 1.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.88 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts predict that IDEX Co. will post 8.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

IDEX Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, May 30th. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 19th will be issued a dividend of $0.71 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, May 19th. This represents a $2.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.57%. This is a boost from IDEX's previous quarterly dividend of $0.69. IDEX's dividend payout ratio is presently 45.01%.

IDEX Profile

IDEX Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides applied solutions worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Fluid & Metering Technologies (FMT), Health & Science Technologies (HST), and Fire & Safety/Diversified Products (FSDP). The FMT segment designs, produces, and distributes positive displacement pumps, valves, small volume provers, flow meters, injectors, and other fluid-handling pump modules and systems, as well as flow monitoring and other services for the food, chemical, general industrial, water and wastewater, agricultural, and energy industries.