Swedbank AB Has $89.83 Million Holdings in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Swedbank AB lessened its position in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) by 0.7% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 154,107 shares of the technology company’s stock after selling 1,081 shares during the period. Swedbank AB’s holdings in MSCI were worth $89,834,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of MSCI. Rothschild Investment LLC bought a new position in shares of MSCI in the 2nd quarter worth about $26,000. HWG Holdings LP acquired a new stake in MSCI during the second quarter worth approximately $27,000. Ridgewood Investments LLC bought a new stake in MSCI in the second quarter worth approximately $40,000. Ashton Thomas Securities LLC acquired a new position in MSCI in the third quarter valued at approximately $40,000. Finally, Planning Capital Management Corp boosted its holdings in shares of MSCI by 35.1% during the 3rd quarter. Planning Capital Management Corp now owns 77 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $45,000 after buying an additional 20 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have recently weighed in on MSCI. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of MSCI from $640.00 to $662.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating 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 objective on the stock in a report on Wednesday, October 9th. Royal Bank of Canada reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $638.00 price objective on shares of MSCI in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays boosted their target price on MSCI from $650.00 to $700.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, September 13th. Finally, Evercore ISI assumed coverage on MSCI in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $690.00 price target on the stock. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, MSCI has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $631.83.

MSCI Trading Up 1.4 %

Shares of NYSE:MSCI opened at $589.57 on Monday. The stock has a market cap of $46.20 billion, a PE ratio of 38.71, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.06 and a beta of 1.11. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $586.39 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $542.48. MSCI Inc. has a 1-year low of $439.95 and a 1-year high of $631.70.

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

MSCI Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 29th. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 15th will be issued a $1.60 dividend. This represents a $6.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.09%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 15th. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is presently 42.02%.

MSCI Company 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.