StepStone Group's (STEP) Sell (D+) Rating Reaffirmed at Weiss Ratings

Key Points

• StepStone Group's stock has been rated as "sell (D+)" by Weiss Ratings, while other analysts have issued varying ratings, with Goldman Sachs upgrading the stock from "neutral" to "buy" and raising its target price to $83.00.
• The company's latest quarterly report showed a revenue of $237.47 million, missing analyst expectations, with a year-over-year revenue increase of 95.4% despite a reported earnings per share of $0.40, below the consensus estimate of $0.42.
• Insider trading activities indicate a decrease in ownership, with CEO Scott W. Hart selling 10,000 shares and CFO David Y. Park also reducing their stake, as insiders collectively sold shares valued at $1,937,460 in the last quarter.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP - Get Free Report)'s stock had its "sell (d+)" rating reiterated by equities researchers at Weiss Ratings in a note issued to investors on Wednesday,Weiss Ratings reports.

STEP has been the subject of several other research reports. Barclays set a $70.00 price objective on StepStone Group in a report on Wednesday. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded StepStone Group from a "neutral" rating to a "buy" rating and raised their target price for the company from $64.00 to $83.00 in a research note on Wednesday, September 17th. Evercore ISI raised their target price on StepStone Group from $56.00 to $61.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research note on Thursday, July 10th. BMO Capital Markets initiated coverage on StepStone Group in a research note on Friday, October 3rd. They issued an "outperform" rating and a $74.00 target price for the company. Finally, Zacks Research cut StepStone Group from a "strong-buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 13th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, three have assigned a Buy rating, four have issued a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of "Hold" and a consensus price target of $69.71.

StepStone Group Stock Performance

NASDAQ STEP opened at $62.97 on Wednesday. StepStone Group has a fifty-two week low of $40.07 and a fifty-two week high of $70.38. The stock has a 50 day simple moving average of $62.03 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $57.32. The stock has a market cap of $7.33 billion, a P/E ratio of -20.44 and a beta of 1.37.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, August 7th. The company reported $0.40 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.42 by ($0.02). StepStone Group had a positive return on equity of 16.07% and a negative net margin of 17.10%.The business had revenue of $237.47 million during the quarter, compared to analysts' expectations of $238.99 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.48 EPS. The company's quarterly revenue was up 95.4% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that StepStone Group will post 1.82 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other StepStone Group news, CEO Scott W. Hart sold 10,000 shares of StepStone Group stock in a transaction on Monday, August 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $61.44, for a total transaction of $614,400.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 50,000 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,072,000. The trade was a 16.67% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CFO David Y. Park sold 1,000 shares of StepStone Group stock in a transaction on Thursday, September 11th. The shares were sold at an average price of $63.26, for a total value of $63,260.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer owned 22,020 shares of the company's stock, valued at $1,392,985.20. The trade was a 4.34% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 31,000 shares of company stock valued at $1,937,460 in the last quarter. 16.47% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of STEP. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its stake in shares of StepStone Group by 7,134.2% in the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 61,057 shares of the company's stock worth $3,189,000 after purchasing an additional 60,213 shares during the last quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. raised its stake in shares of StepStone Group by 42.8% in the first quarter. Harbor Capital Advisors Inc. now owns 23,527 shares of the company's stock worth $1,229,000 after purchasing an additional 7,053 shares during the last quarter. Yousif Capital Management LLC raised its stake in shares of StepStone Group by 2.7% in the first quarter. Yousif Capital Management LLC now owns 24,558 shares of the company's stock worth $1,283,000 after purchasing an additional 641 shares during the last quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB raised its stake in shares of StepStone Group by 44.1% in the first quarter. Handelsbanken Fonder AB now owns 21,228 shares of the company's stock worth $1,109,000 after purchasing an additional 6,500 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Vicus Capital raised its stake in shares of StepStone Group by 9.8% in the first quarter. Vicus Capital now owns 4,020 shares of the company's stock worth $210,000 after purchasing an additional 359 shares during the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 55.54% of the company's stock.

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.

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