Hartford Investment Management Co. Cuts Stock Position in MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI)

Hartford Investment Management Co. lessened its stake in shares of MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) by 1.9% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 4,852 shares of the technology company’s stock after selling 94 shares during the quarter. Hartford Investment Management Co.’s holdings in MSCI were worth $2,911,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Several other large investors have also modified their holdings of the stock. State Street Corp grew its holdings in MSCI by 0.4% during the third quarter. State Street Corp now owns 3,192,364 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,860,925,000 after acquiring an additional 11,351 shares during the period. Edgewood Management LLC grew its holdings in MSCI by 16.9% during the third quarter. Edgewood Management LLC now owns 2,195,639 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,279,904,000 after acquiring an additional 318,214 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in MSCI by 0.7% during the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,862,362 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $1,082,594,000 after acquiring an additional 13,691 shares during the period. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA grew its holdings in MSCI by 14.3% during the third quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 1,587,723 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $925,531,000 after acquiring an additional 198,666 shares during the period. Finally, Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its holdings in MSCI by 2.6% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 1,493,534 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $870,627,000 after acquiring an additional 37,340 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 89.97% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts recently weighed in on the company. Royal Bank of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $675.00 price objective on shares of MSCI in a report on Thursday, January 30th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on MSCI from $700.00 to $680.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Barclays lowered their target price on MSCI from $700.00 to $675.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, January 30th. UBS Group lowered their target price on MSCI from $695.00 to $680.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Wolfe Research raised MSCI from a “peer perform” rating to an “outperform” rating in a report on Thursday, December 12th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eleven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $649.23.

MSCI Stock Down 0.9 %

Shares of NYSE:MSCI opened at $572.05 on Thursday. MSCI Inc. has a 52-week low of $439.95 and a 52-week high of $642.45. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $604.06 and its 200-day simple moving average is $586.25. The company has a market capitalization of $44.83 billion, a P/E ratio of 40.69, a P/E/G ratio of 2.67 and a beta of 1.11.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The technology company reported $4.18 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate 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 prior year, the company earned $3.68 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that MSCI Inc. will post 16.86 earnings per share for the current year.

MSCI Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 28th. Investors of record on Friday, February 14th will be given a dividend of $1.80 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 14th. This is an increase from MSCI’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.60. This represents a $7.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.26%. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is 45.52%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other MSCI news, CEO Henry A. Fernandez bought 2,900 shares of MSCI stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 5th. The shares were purchased at an average cost of $612.80 per share, for a total transaction of $1,777,120.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 330,379 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $202,456,251.20. This represents a 0.89 % increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. 3.20% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

About MSCI

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.