Kathy Card Beckles Sells 326 Shares of Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK) Stock

Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK) insider Kathy Card Beckles sold 326 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, July 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $300.86, for a total value of $98,080.36. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 9,319 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,803,714.34. The trade was a 3.38% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

Verisk Analytics Price Performance

NASDAQ:VRSK opened at $302.54 on Wednesday. The firm has a market capitalization of $42.32 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 44.30, a PEG ratio of 3.82 and a beta of 0.86. Verisk Analytics, Inc. has a 1 year low of $257.59 and a 1 year high of $322.92. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $308.84 and a 200-day simple moving average of $294.93. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 26.13, a current ratio of 1.27 and a quick ratio of 1.27.

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, May 7th. The business services provider reported $1.73 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.68 by $0.05. The business had revenue of $753.00 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $750.31 million. Verisk Analytics had a return on equity of 396.08% and a net margin of 33.13%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 7.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned $1.63 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Verisk Analytics, Inc. will post 6.63 EPS for the current year.

Verisk Analytics Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, June 30th. Stockholders of record on Friday, June 13th were issued a $0.45 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, June 13th. This represents a $1.80 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.59%. Verisk Analytics’s payout ratio is 26.35%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Verisk Analytics

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of VRSK. Louisbourg Investments Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Verisk Analytics in the first quarter worth approximately $25,000. SBI Securities Co. Ltd. purchased a new stake in shares of Verisk Analytics in the fourth quarter worth approximately $30,000. Rakuten Securities Inc. raised its holdings in shares of Verisk Analytics by 6,050.0% in the fourth quarter. Rakuten Securities Inc. now owns 123 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $34,000 after buying an additional 121 shares during the period. Global Financial Private Client LLC raised its holdings in shares of Verisk Analytics by 966.7% in the first quarter. Global Financial Private Client LLC now owns 128 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $38,000 after buying an additional 116 shares during the period. Finally, Minot DeBlois Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Verisk Analytics in the fourth quarter worth approximately $39,000. 90.00% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

VRSK has been the subject of a number of research reports. UBS Group increased their price target on Verisk Analytics from $295.00 to $320.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, May 12th. Bank of America initiated coverage on Verisk Analytics in a research note on Thursday, April 10th. They set an “underperform” rating and a $280.00 price target for the company. Finally, Robert W. Baird increased their price target on Verisk Analytics from $320.00 to $335.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 8th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, six have assigned a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Verisk Analytics has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $302.40.

About Verisk Analytics

Verisk Analytics, Inc provides data analytics and technology solutions to the insurance markets in the United States and internationally. It offers policy language, prospective loss costs, policy writing and rating rules, and various underwriting solutions for risk selection and segmentation, pricing, and workflow optimization; property- and auto- specific rating and underwriting information solutions that allows clients to understand, quantify, underwrite, mitigate, and avoid potential loss for risks; catastrophe modeling solutions, which enables companies to identify, quantify, and plan for the financial consequences of catastrophes for use by insurers, reinsurers, intermediaries, financial institutions, and governments.