Wedge Capital Management L L P NC Makes New $232,000 Investment in BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK)

Wedge Capital Management L L P NC purchased a new position in BlackRock, Inc. (NYSE:BLK) during the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor purchased 286 shares of the asset manager’s stock, valued at approximately $232,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of BLK. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of BlackRock by 77,524.5% during the fourth quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 641,955 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $5,211,390,000 after buying an additional 641,128 shares during the period. FMR LLC lifted its stake in shares of BlackRock by 22.0% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 2,105,314 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,361,064,000 after buying an additional 379,631 shares during the period. Invesco Ltd. lifted its stake in shares of BlackRock by 84.4% during the third quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 744,770 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $481,486,000 after buying an additional 340,792 shares during the period. Wellington Management Group LLP lifted its stake in shares of BlackRock by 21.4% during the third quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 1,745,648 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,128,544,000 after buying an additional 307,516 shares during the period. Finally, Envestnet Asset Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of BlackRock by 24.3% during the third quarter. Envestnet Asset Management Inc. now owns 713,771 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $461,446,000 after buying an additional 139,570 shares during the period. 80.69% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insider Transactions at BlackRock

In other news, CEO Laurence Fink sold 30,978 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $809.92, for a total value of $25,089,701.76. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 414,146 shares in the company, valued at approximately $335,425,128.32. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. In other BlackRock news, CEO Laurence Fink sold 30,978 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $809.92, for a total transaction of $25,089,701.76. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 414,146 shares in the company, valued at approximately $335,425,128.32. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, Director J. Richard Kushel sold 3,418 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $781.11, for a total transaction of $2,669,833.98. Following the sale, the director now owns 70,378 shares in the company, valued at $54,972,959.58. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders have sold 82,511 shares of company stock worth $66,778,367. 0.90% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

BlackRock Stock Performance

NYSE:BLK opened at $762.83 on Friday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 3.48 and a quick ratio of 3.48. The firm has a market capitalization of $113.62 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.39, a PEG ratio of 1.58 and a beta of 1.37. The company’s 50-day moving average is $802.08 and its two-hundred day moving average is $760.15. BlackRock, Inc. has a 1-year low of $596.18 and a 1-year high of $845.00.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) last posted its earnings results on Friday, April 12th. The asset manager reported $9.81 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $9.42 by $0.39. The company had revenue of $4.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $4.65 billion. BlackRock had a net margin of 32.26% and a return on equity of 15.34%. BlackRock’s revenue was up 11.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $7.93 EPS. Analysts forecast that BlackRock, Inc. will post 41.19 EPS for the current year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts recently issued reports on BLK shares. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods restated an “outperform” rating and set a $930.00 target price (up from $918.00) on shares of BlackRock in a research report on Friday, April 5th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on shares of BlackRock from $1,013.00 to $1,025.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, April 15th. TD Cowen raised shares of BlackRock from a “market perform” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their target price for the stock from $819.00 to $938.00 in a research note on Tuesday, January 16th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their target price on shares of BlackRock from $742.00 to $767.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 2nd. Finally, UBS Group upped their price objective on shares of BlackRock from $818.00 to $850.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, April 12th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have given a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $845.42.

About BlackRock

BlackRock, Inc is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks.