Blue Edge Capital LLC Reduces Position in Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO)

Blue Edge Capital LLC reduced its position in Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO) by 7.7% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 4,326 shares of the business services provider’s stock after selling 359 shares during the period. Blue Edge Capital LLC’s holdings in Moody’s were worth $2,048,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Asset Planning Inc acquired a new position in shares of Moody’s during the fourth quarter worth approximately $42,000. OFI Invest Asset Management acquired a new stake in Moody’s during the 4th quarter valued at $41,000. Albion Financial Group UT acquired a new position in shares of Moody’s in the fourth quarter worth $45,000. Activest Wealth Management acquired a new position in shares of Moody’s in the fourth quarter worth $47,000. Finally, Sunbelt Securities Inc. increased its stake in shares of Moody’s by 101.9% in the third quarter. Sunbelt Securities Inc. now owns 109 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $52,000 after acquiring an additional 55 shares during the last quarter. 92.11% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have issued reports on the stock. Mizuho started coverage on shares of Moody’s in a report on Wednesday, March 12th. They set a “neutral” rating and a $504.00 price target for the company. Barclays dropped their price objective on shares of Moody’s from $570.00 to $520.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, April 4th. William Blair reissued an “outperform” rating on shares of Moody’s in a research note on Friday, February 14th. BMO Capital Markets increased their price target on shares of Moody’s from $481.00 to $531.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, February 18th. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Moody’s from $481.00 to $508.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday, February 14th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $523.43.

Moody’s Trading Up 10.7 %

Shares of NYSE MCO opened at $439.22 on Thursday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $473.99 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $476.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.81, a quick ratio of 1.67 and a current ratio of 1.47. Moody’s Co. has a 52-week low of $360.05 and a 52-week high of $531.93. The stock has a market cap of $79.01 billion, a P/E ratio of 38.97, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.38.

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The business services provider reported $2.62 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $2.27 by $0.35. The business had revenue of $1.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.70 billion. Moody’s had a net margin of 29.03% and a return on equity of 58.94%. As a group, equities analysts forecast that Moody’s Co. will post 13.95 EPS for the current year.

Moody’s Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 14th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 25th were issued a dividend of $0.94 per share. This is an increase from Moody’s’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.85. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 25th. This represents a $3.76 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.86%. Moody’s’s dividend payout ratio is presently 33.36%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Robert Fauber sold 281 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, February 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $494.42, for a total value of $138,932.02. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 61,894 shares in the company, valued at $30,601,631.48. This represents a 0.45 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Over the last 90 days, insiders have sold 1,258 shares of company stock worth $610,936. Insiders own 0.14% of the company’s stock.

Moody’s Profile

Moody’s Corporation operates as an integrated risk assessment firm worldwide. It operates in two segments, Moody’s Analytics and Moody’s Investors Services. The Moody’s Analytics segment develops a range of products and services that support the risk management activities of institutional participants in financial markets.