HighTower Advisors LLC Raises Stock Holdings in Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYX)

HighTower Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of Paychex, Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYX) by 17.9% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 169,309 shares of the business services provider’s stock after buying an additional 25,755 shares during the quarter. HighTower Advisors LLC’s holdings in Paychex were worth $23,741,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other large investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. State Street Corp boosted its holdings in shares of Paychex by 0.5% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 13,230,236 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $1,775,365,000 after purchasing an additional 60,455 shares during the period. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. raised its position in Paychex by 5.5% during the 4th quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 10,044,631 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $1,408,458,000 after purchasing an additional 519,761 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its position in shares of Paychex by 2.1% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 9,414,072 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $1,262,700,000 after buying an additional 190,937 shares during the last quarter. Barclays PLC grew its position in shares of Paychex by 46.2% in the 3rd quarter. Barclays PLC now owns 1,748,485 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $234,627,000 after buying an additional 552,540 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Guinness Asset Management LTD increased its stake in shares of Paychex by 5.2% during the fourth quarter. Guinness Asset Management LTD now owns 1,649,758 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $231,295,000 after buying an additional 82,091 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 83.47% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages recently commented on PAYX. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed a “sector perform” rating and issued a $148.00 price target on shares of Paychex in a research note on Friday, December 20th. UBS Group lifted their target price on shares of Paychex from $152.00 to $155.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price target on shares of Paychex from $133.00 to $139.00 and gave the company an “underweight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. Finally, Barclays lifted their price objective on Paychex from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Monday, December 23rd. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating and eleven have assigned a hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $133.23.

Paychex Stock Up 1.3 %

Shares of NASDAQ:PAYX opened at $145.44 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 1.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.20. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $147.06 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $142.09. Paychex, Inc. has a 12-month low of $114.72 and a 12-month high of $158.37. The stock has a market capitalization of $52.37 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.62, a PEG ratio of 4.10 and a beta of 0.98.

Paychex (NASDAQ:PAYX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, December 19th. The business services provider reported $1.14 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.12 by $0.02. The firm had revenue of $1.32 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.31 billion. Paychex had a return on equity of 45.28% and a net margin of 32.02%. Paychex’s quarterly revenue was up 4.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $1.08 EPS. On average, research analysts anticipate that Paychex, Inc. will post 4.99 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Paychex Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, February 27th. Investors of record on Friday, February 7th were given a dividend of $0.98 per share. This represents a $3.92 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.70%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, February 7th. Paychex’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 82.53%.

Paychex Company Profile

Paychex, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides integrated human capital management solutions (HCM) for payroll, benefits, human resources (HR), and insurance services for small to medium-sized businesses in the United States, Europe, and India. It offers payroll processing services; payroll tax administration services; employee payment services; and regulatory compliance services, such as new-hire reporting and garnishment processing.