Insider Selling: MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) General Counsel Sells 100 Shares of Stock

Key Points

• MarketAxess General Counsel Scott Pintoff sold 100 shares on June 10 at an average price of $116.03, totaling $11,603. After the sale, he still held 11,786 shares, and the transaction reduced his ownership by 0.84%.
• This was Pintoff’s third recent stock sale, following similar 100-share sales on May 11 and April 10 at much higher prices of $146.99 and $171.96, respectively.
• MarketAxess recently beat earnings estimates, reporting quarterly EPS of $2.25 versus $2.15 expected, while revenue rose 11.9% year over year to $233.38 million. The company also paid a quarterly dividend of $0.78, for a 2.6% yield.

MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX - Get Free Report) General Counsel Scott Pintoff sold 100 shares of MarketAxess stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $116.03, for a total transaction of $11,603.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel directly owned 11,786 shares in the company, valued at $1,367,529.58. The trade was a 0.84% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link.

Scott Pintoff also recently made the following trade(s):

• On Monday, May 11th, Scott Pintoff sold 100 shares of MarketAxess stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $146.99, for a total transaction of $14,699.00.
• On Friday, April 10th, Scott Pintoff sold 100 shares of MarketAxess stock. The shares were sold at an average price of $171.96, for a total transaction of $17,196.00.

MarketAxess Stock Performance

Shares of MarketAxess stock traded up $4.56 during trading on Friday, reaching $120.89. The company's stock had a trading volume of 676,791 shares, compared to its average volume of 573,082. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $148.68 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $165.65. The firm has a market cap of $4.30 billion, a PE ratio of 14.29, a P/E/G ratio of 3.75 and a beta of 0.86. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $113.29 and a fifty-two week high of $228.16. The company has a current ratio of 2.17, a quick ratio of 2.17 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 7th. The financial services provider reported $2.25 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $2.15 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $233.38 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $231.91 million. MarketAxess had a net margin of 35.53% and a return on equity of 22.28%. MarketAxess's revenue was up 11.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $1.87 EPS. On average, analysts forecast that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 8.02 EPS for the current year.

MarketAxess Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 3rd. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, May 20th were paid a $0.78 dividend. This represents a $3.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 2.6%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, May 20th. MarketAxess's payout ratio is currently 36.88%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On MarketAxess

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in MKTX. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 169.0% during the 4th quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 2,558,097 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $463,655,000 after purchasing an additional 1,607,009 shares during the period. Primecap Management Co. CA grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 42.4% during the 4th quarter. Primecap Management Co. CA now owns 3,175,425 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $575,546,000 after purchasing an additional 944,830 shares during the period. Bank of Montreal Can grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 5,086.4% during the 4th quarter. Bank of Montreal Can now owns 951,024 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $172,373,000 after purchasing an additional 932,687 shares during the period. North Reef Capital Management LP grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 76.6% during the 4th quarter. North Reef Capital Management LP now owns 1,609,330 shares of the financial services provider's stock worth $291,691,000 after purchasing an additional 697,972 shares during the period. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 4th quarter worth $91,324,000. 99.01% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have issued reports on MKTX. Weiss Ratings cut shares of MarketAxess from a "hold (c-)" rating to a "sell (d+)" rating in a research note on Wednesday, May 6th. Argus cut shares of MarketAxess from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 17th. Bank of America raised shares of MarketAxess from an "underperform" rating to a "neutral" rating and set a $170.00 price objective on the stock in a research note on Friday. UBS Group dropped their price objective on shares of MarketAxess from $225.00 to $215.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, May 11th. Finally, Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of MarketAxess from $189.00 to $170.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, May 11th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $183.10.

MarketAxess Company Profile

MarketAxess Holdings Inc operates a leading global electronic trading platform specializing in fixed-income securities and related products. The company's network enables institutional investors and broker-dealers to trade corporate bonds, municipal securities, emerging markets debt, U.S. Treasuries and credit default swaps in an automated, multi-dealer environment. MarketAxess also offers portfolio trading, data analytics, best-execution tools and post-trade services to streamline workflows and enhance price discovery across its marketplace.

In addition to core voice-like trading protocols, MarketAxess provides Open Trading®, an anonymous, all-to-all trading protocol designed to improve liquidity and transaction efficiency.

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