Jason P. Ment Sells 55,608 Shares of StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP) Stock

StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP - Get Free Report) insider Jason P. Ment sold 55,608 shares of StepStone Group stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 28th. The stock was sold at an average price of $60.71, for a total transaction of $3,375,961.68. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now directly owns 34,155 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $2,073,550.05. This represents a 61.95% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

StepStone Group Price Performance

Shares of STEP stock traded down $1.31 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $57.81. 776,842 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 686,819. The stock's 50-day moving average is $52.32 and its 200-day moving average is $57.65. The stock has a market cap of $6.70 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -34.21 and a beta of 1.37. StepStone Group LP has a 52 week low of $40.07 and a 52 week high of $70.38.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP - Get Free Report) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, May 22nd. The company reported $0.68 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $0.44 by $0.24. The company had revenue of $295.86 million for the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $231.87 million. StepStone Group had a positive return on equity of 12.04% and a negative net margin of 11.29%. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 66.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $0.33 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that StepStone Group LP will post 1.82 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

StepStone Group Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 30th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 13th will be issued a dividend of $0.24 per share. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.66%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, June 13th. StepStone Group's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently -40.17%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On StepStone Group

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the business. Barclays PLC raised its position in StepStone Group by 368.2% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 112,019 shares of the company's stock valued at $6,366,000 after buying an additional 88,095 shares during the last quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC raised its position in StepStone Group by 166.1% in the 4th quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC now owns 1,602 shares of the company's stock valued at $93,000 after buying an additional 1,000 shares during the last quarter. Blue Trust Inc. raised its position in StepStone Group by 25.5% in the 4th quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 1,079 shares of the company's stock valued at $61,000 after buying an additional 219 shares during the last quarter. KBC Group NV raised its position in StepStone Group by 64.8% in the 4th quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 3,032 shares of the company's stock valued at $175,000 after buying an additional 1,192 shares during the last quarter. Finally, R Squared Ltd acquired a new stake in StepStone Group in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $91,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 55.54% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have issued reports on STEP. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price objective on StepStone Group from $57.00 to $63.00 and gave the stock a "neutral" rating in a report on Wednesday. Morgan Stanley reduced their price objective on StepStone Group from $66.00 to $51.00 and set an "equal weight" rating for the company in a research report on Monday, April 14th. Evercore ISI boosted their price target on StepStone Group from $63.00 to $69.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Monday, February 10th. Oppenheimer set a $67.00 price target on StepStone Group and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Wednesday, April 16th. Finally, Barclays set a $62.00 target price on StepStone Group and gave the stock an "equal weight" rating in a research report on Tuesday, May 27th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, StepStone Group has an average rating of "Hold" and an average target price of $62.57.

About StepStone Group

StepStone Group Inc is a private equity and venture capital firm specializing in direct, fund of funds, secondary direct, and secondary indirect investments. For direct investment, it seeks to invest in private debt, venture debt, incubation, mezzanine, distressed/vulture, seed/startup, early venture, mid venture, late venture, emerging growth, later stage, turnaround, growth capital, industry consolidation, recapitalization, buyout investments in mature and middle market companies.