True North Advisors LLC Acquires Shares of 507 MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

True North Advisors LLC purchased a new position in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm purchased 507 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $304,000.

A number of other hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of the stock. Prime Capital Investment Advisors LLC increased its position in MSCI by 30.0% during the 3rd quarter. Prime Capital Investment Advisors LLC now owns 564 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $329,000 after purchasing an additional 130 shares in the last quarter. Grove Bank & Trust boosted its holdings in shares of MSCI by 52.4% during the 3rd quarter. Grove Bank & Trust now owns 3,779 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $2,203,000 after acquiring an additional 1,299 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. grew its position in MSCI by 30.9% during the 4th quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 174,982 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $104,991,000 after acquiring an additional 41,346 shares during the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased its holdings in MSCI by 4.5% in the 3rd quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 536,211 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $312,574,000 after purchasing an additional 23,050 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Mizuho Securities USA LLC raised its position in MSCI by 339.6% in the third quarter. Mizuho Securities USA LLC now owns 26,834 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $15,642,000 after purchasing an additional 20,730 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez bought 2,900 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, December 5th. The shares were purchased at an average price of $612.80 per share, with a total value of $1,777,120.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 330,379 shares in the company, valued at $202,456,251.20. This represents a 0.89 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The purchase was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. 3.20% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have recently issued reports on MSCI shares. UBS Group lowered their price objective on MSCI from $695.00 to $680.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Redburn Atlantic upgraded shares of MSCI from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $680.00 price target on the stock in a report on Wednesday, October 9th. Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on MSCI from $662.00 to $695.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, December 12th. Wolfe Research raised MSCI from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price target on MSCI from $680.00 to $700.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday. Four analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $649.85.

MSCI Stock Down 0.5 %

NYSE:MSCI opened at $614.25 on Thursday. MSCI Inc. has a twelve month low of $439.95 and a twelve month high of $642.45. The company has a fifty day moving average of $604.53 and a 200-day moving average of $576.95. The firm has a market capitalization of $48.14 billion, a P/E ratio of 40.33, a P/E/G ratio of 2.80 and a beta of 1.11.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The technology company reported $3.86 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.77 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $724.70 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $716.15 million. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 162.06% and a net margin of 43.06%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 15.9% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $3.45 earnings per share. On average, analysts anticipate that MSCI Inc. will post 14.98 EPS for the current fiscal year.

MSCI Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, November 29th. Investors of record on Friday, November 15th were given a dividend of $1.60 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, November 15th. This represents a $6.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.04%. MSCI’s payout ratio is 42.02%.

MSCI Profile

MSCI Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides critical decision support tools and solutions for the investment community to manage investment processes worldwide. The Index segment provides indexes for use in various areas of the investment process, including indexed financial product, such as ETFs, mutual funds, annuities, futures, options, structured products, and over-the-counter derivatives; performance benchmarking; portfolio construction and rebalancing; and asset allocation, as well as licenses GICS and GICS Direct.