Louisiana State Employees Retirement System Purchases New Position in Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK)

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System bought a new position in shares of Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK - Free Report) during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund bought 20,300 shares of the business services provider's stock, valued at approximately $4,849,000.

Other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its stake in Verisk Analytics by 5.5% in the third quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 7,523,191 shares of the business services provider's stock valued at $1,777,279,000 after purchasing an additional 392,945 shares in the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in Verisk Analytics by 3.8% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 4,929,841 shares of the business services provider's stock valued at $1,164,626,000 after purchasing an additional 182,631 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in Verisk Analytics by 1.3% in the first quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,821,265 shares of the business services provider's stock valued at $731,736,000 after purchasing an additional 49,928 shares in the last quarter. Morgan Stanley boosted its stake in shares of Verisk Analytics by 248.2% during the 4th quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 3,765,708 shares of the business services provider's stock worth $664,346,000 after acquiring an additional 2,684,234 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Citigroup Inc. boosted its stake in shares of Verisk Analytics by 1,404.8% during the 3rd quarter. Citigroup Inc. now owns 1,992,727 shares of the business services provider's stock worth $470,762,000 after acquiring an additional 1,860,298 shares in the last quarter. 90.00% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CAO David J. Grover sold 6,481 shares of Verisk Analytics stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, March 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $233.06, for a total transaction of $1,510,461.86. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 12,140 shares in the company, valued at $2,829,348.40. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. In other news, CAO David J. Grover sold 6,481 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $233.06, for a total transaction of $1,510,461.86. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now owns 12,140 shares in the company, valued at $2,829,348.40. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Nicholas Daffan sold 1,507 shares of the business's stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $249.25, for a total value of $375,619.75. Following the sale, the insider now owns 50,208 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $12,514,344. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 9,771 shares of company stock worth $2,307,406. Company insiders own 1.31% of the company's stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

VRSK has been the subject of several recent analyst reports. Evercore ISI reaffirmed an "in-line" rating and issued a $250.00 price target on shares of Verisk Analytics in a report on Tuesday, March 26th. Bank of America cut Verisk Analytics from a "buy" rating to a "neutral" rating and cut their price target for the company from $270.00 to $260.00 in a report on Monday, January 8th. Nine investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $252.00.

Verisk Analytics Trading Down 0.4 %

Verisk Analytics stock traded down $0.83 during mid-day trading on Friday, hitting $222.53. 1,039,679 shares of the company's stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 940,094. The firm has a market capitalization of $31.76 billion, a P/E ratio of 52.86, a PEG ratio of 2.77 and a beta of 0.78. Verisk Analytics, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $187.86 and a fifty-two week high of $251.98. The company has a quick ratio of 1.05, a current ratio of 1.05 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 8.85. The company's 50 day simple moving average is $237.88 and its 200-day simple moving average is $237.69.

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 21st. The business services provider reported $1.40 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.44 by ($0.04). Verisk Analytics had a net margin of 22.92% and a return on equity of 305.15%. The firm had revenue of $677.20 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $673.56 million. During the same period in the prior year, the business earned $1.43 EPS. The business's revenue for the quarter was up 7.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Verisk Analytics, Inc. will post 6.48 earnings per share for the current year.

Verisk Analytics declared that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase plan on Wednesday, February 21st that permits the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization permits the business services provider to repurchase up to 2.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback plans are usually an indication that the company's board of directors believes its shares are undervalued.

Verisk Analytics Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 29th. Investors of record on Friday, March 15th were given a $0.39 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Thursday, March 14th. This represents a $1.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.70%. This is an increase from Verisk Analytics's previous quarterly dividend of $0.34. Verisk Analytics's payout ratio is currently 37.05%.

Verisk Analytics Company Profile

Verisk Analytics, Inc provides data analytics and technology solutions to the insurance markets in the United States and internationally. It offers policy language, prospective loss costs, policy writing and rating rules, and various underwriting solutions for risk selection and segmentation, pricing, and workflow optimization; property- and auto- specific rating and underwriting information solutions that allows clients to understand, quantify, underwrite, mitigate, and avoid potential loss for risks; catastrophe modeling solutions, which enables companies to identify, quantify, and plan for the financial consequences of catastrophes for use by insurers, reinsurers, intermediaries, financial institutions, and governments.