MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) Releases Earnings Results, Beats Estimates By $0.09 EPS

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) announced its earnings results on Tuesday. The technology company reported $3.86 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.77 by $0.09, Briefing.com reports. The company had revenue of $724.70 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $716.15 million. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 143.09% and a net margin of 43.86%. MSCI’s revenue for the quarter was up 15.9% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $3.45 earnings per share.

MSCI Stock Performance

MSCI stock traded down $5.74 on Wednesday, reaching $573.19. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 127,405 shares, compared to its average volume of 537,876. MSCI has a twelve month low of $439.95 and a twelve month high of $631.70. The company has a market cap of $45.08 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 38.72, a PEG ratio of 3.09 and a beta of 1.11. The business’s fifty day moving average price is $579.80 and its 200 day moving average price is $529.06.

MSCI Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, November 29th. Shareholders of record on Friday, November 15th will be paid a $1.60 dividend. This represents a $6.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.12%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, November 15th. MSCI’s dividend payout ratio is currently 42.87%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research firms have commented on MSCI. Argus upped their price objective on shares of MSCI from $520.00 to $600.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday, July 26th. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their target price on MSCI from $526.00 to $590.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, July 24th. Wells Fargo & Company raised their price objective on MSCI from $570.00 to $600.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, October 11th. Barclays raised their price objective on MSCI from $650.00 to $700.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, September 13th. Finally, Redburn Atlantic upgraded MSCI from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $680.00 price objective for the company in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. Seven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $622.54.

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.