William Blair Boosts Earnings Estimates for Verisk Analytics

Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK - Free Report) - Investment analysts at William Blair upped their Q2 2025 EPS estimates for Verisk Analytics in a research note issued to investors on Wednesday, May 7th. William Blair analyst A. Nicholas now expects that the business services provider will post earnings per share of $1.78 for the quarter, up from their previous estimate of $1.77. The consensus estimate for Verisk Analytics' current full-year earnings is $6.63 per share. William Blair also issued estimates for Verisk Analytics' FY2025 earnings at $7.03 EPS.

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 7th. The business services provider reported $1.73 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.68 by $0.05. The business had revenue of $753.00 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $750.31 million. Verisk Analytics had a net margin of 32.65% and a return on equity of 274.13%. The company's revenue was up 7.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.63 EPS.

Several other brokerages also recently weighed in on VRSK. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price objective on shares of Verisk Analytics from $280.00 to $297.00 and gave the stock a "market perform" rating in a research report on Thursday, February 27th. Robert W. Baird lifted their target price on shares of Verisk Analytics from $320.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a report on Thursday. Wells Fargo & Company cut their target price on shares of Verisk Analytics from $325.00 to $321.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, February 27th. Finally, Bank of America began coverage on shares of Verisk Analytics in a report on Thursday, April 10th. They issued an "underperform" rating and a $280.00 target price on the stock. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have given a hold rating and three have given a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and a consensus target price of $298.90.

Verisk Analytics Stock Up 0.5%

Shares of NASDAQ:VRSK opened at $309.50 on Monday. The company has a market capitalization of $43.31 billion, a PE ratio of 48.28, a P/E/G ratio of 3.37 and a beta of 0.89. The company has a current ratio of 0.82, a quick ratio of 0.82 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 8.36. Verisk Analytics has a twelve month low of $245.01 and a twelve month high of $312.82. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $292.29 and a 200-day simple moving average of $286.97.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. increased its stake in shares of Verisk Analytics by 1.5% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 16,733,589 shares of the business services provider's stock valued at $4,980,251,000 after acquiring an additional 239,483 shares during the last quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. increased its stake in shares of Verisk Analytics by 8.1% during the 4th quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 5,210,080 shares of the business services provider's stock valued at $1,435,012,000 after acquiring an additional 392,270 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC increased its position in Verisk Analytics by 1.6% during the 4th quarter. FMR LLC now owns 4,691,016 shares of the business services provider's stock worth $1,292,047,000 after purchasing an additional 72,045 shares in the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its position in Verisk Analytics by 0.5% during the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 3,811,563 shares of the business services provider's stock worth $1,051,300,000 after purchasing an additional 19,423 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Verisk Analytics during the 4th quarter worth approximately $526,676,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 90.00% of the company's stock.

Insider Buying and Selling at Verisk Analytics

In related news, Director Bruce Edward Hansen sold 1,179 shares of the business's stock in a transaction dated Friday, March 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $295.36, for a total value of $348,229.44. Following the sale, the director now directly owns 13,786 shares in the company, valued at $4,071,832.96. The trade was a 7.88% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CAO David J. Grover sold 5,705 shares of the company's stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $307.68, for a total transaction of $1,755,314.40. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now owns 12,937 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,980,456.16. This trade represents a 30.60% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 8,363 shares of company stock valued at $2,529,187. 0.46% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Verisk Analytics Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, June 30th. Shareholders of record on Friday, June 13th will be paid a $0.45 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Friday, June 13th. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.58%. Verisk Analytics's dividend payout ratio is currently 26.35%.

Verisk Analytics announced that its board has initiated a share buyback program on Wednesday, February 26th that allows the company to buyback $1.00 billion in shares. This buyback authorization allows the business services provider to buy up to 2.5% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares buyback programs are often an indication that the company's board believes its shares are undervalued.

About Verisk Analytics

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.

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