Horizon Investments LLC Acquires 35 Shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Horizon Investments LLC grew its stake in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) by 3.0% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 1,220 shares of the technology company’s stock after buying an additional 35 shares during the period. Horizon Investments LLC’s holdings in MSCI were worth $732,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of the company. Advisors Asset Management Inc. increased its position in MSCI by 49.6% during the fourth quarter. Advisors Asset Management Inc. now owns 5,087 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $3,052,000 after acquiring an additional 1,686 shares during the last quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans raised its position in MSCI by 62.3% in the 4th quarter. Thrivent Financial for Lutherans now owns 58,061 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $34,837,000 after purchasing an additional 22,285 shares during the period. PDS Planning Inc lifted its stake in MSCI by 8.2% in the fourth quarter. PDS Planning Inc now owns 451 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $271,000 after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the last quarter. Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. lifted its stake in MSCI by 7.8% in the fourth quarter. Tocqueville Asset Management L.P. now owns 5,041 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $3,025,000 after purchasing an additional 365 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Parallel Advisors LLC boosted its position in shares of MSCI by 10.3% during the fourth quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 791 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $475,000 after buying an additional 74 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez purchased 5,300 shares of MSCI stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, February 24th. The stock was purchased at an average price of $574.51 per share, for a total transaction of $3,044,903.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 1,269,951 shares in the company, valued at approximately $729,599,549.01. This trade represents a 0.42 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The acquisition was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. 3.20% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MSCI has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. The Goldman Sachs Group upgraded MSCI from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their price objective for the company from $617.00 to $723.00 in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of MSCI from $700.00 to $680.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $675.00 price target on shares of MSCI in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Wolfe Research raised shares of MSCI from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, December 12th. Finally, Barclays dropped their target price on shares of MSCI from $700.00 to $675.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, MSCI has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $649.23.

MSCI Stock Performance

MSCI opened at $571.25 on Thursday. The company has a fifty day moving average of $582.92 and a two-hundred day moving average of $588.83. MSCI Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $439.95 and a fifty-two week high of $642.45. The stock has a market capitalization of $44.36 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 40.63, a PEG ratio of 2.61 and a beta of 1.19.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The technology company reported $4.18 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.96 by $0.22. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 156.08% and a net margin of 38.83%. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $3.68 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that MSCI Inc. will post 16.86 earnings per share for the current year.

MSCI Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, February 28th. Investors of record on Friday, February 14th were paid a $1.80 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, February 14th. This represents a $7.20 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.26%. This is a boost from MSCI’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.60. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 51.21%.

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.