Swiss National Bank Grows Stock Holdings in IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX)

Swiss National Bank lifted its stake in shares of IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX) by 0.3% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 224,600 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after purchasing an additional 600 shares during the period. Swiss National Bank’s holdings in IDEX were worth $48,177,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

A number of other large investors have also made changes to their positions in the stock. Van ECK Associates Corp raised its holdings in shares of IDEX by 9,424.6% during the 3rd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,032,277 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $211,473,000 after acquiring an additional 1,021,439 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its position in IDEX by 7.5% during the first quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 7,964,956 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,943,609,000 after purchasing an additional 555,250 shares during the last quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC raised its stake in IDEX by 75.6% during the second quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC now owns 519,124 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $104,179,000 after purchasing an additional 223,422 shares during the period. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. boosted its holdings in IDEX by 247.0% in the 2nd quarter. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. now owns 198,170 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $39,872,000 after purchasing an additional 141,064 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Millennium Management LLC grew its stake in shares of IDEX by 1,541.6% in the 2nd quarter. Millennium Management LLC now owns 138,744 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $27,915,000 after buying an additional 130,292 shares during the period. 97.96% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several analysts have recently commented on the stock. DA Davidson reduced their price target on shares of IDEX from $220.00 to $210.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, August 5th. Robert W. Baird cut their target price on IDEX from $245.00 to $241.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Argus lowered IDEX from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Wednesday, August 14th. TD Cowen cut their price objective on IDEX from $240.00 to $230.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, August 7th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus upped their target price on shares of IDEX from $232.00 to $244.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 16th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, IDEX has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $241.14.

IDEX Stock Performance

Shares of IDEX stock opened at $223.11 on Thursday. The stock has a market capitalization of $16.89 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.54, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.41 and a beta of 0.96. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 2.97 and a quick ratio of 2.11. The business has a 50-day moving average of $213.84 and a 200 day moving average of $207.76. IDEX Co. has a 12 month low of $189.51 and a 12 month high of $246.36.

IDEX (NYSE:IEX) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The industrial products company reported $1.90 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.89 by $0.01. IDEX had a net margin of 15.35% and a return on equity of 15.92%. The business had revenue of $798.20 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $793.05 million. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $2.12 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up .6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts forecast that IDEX Co. will post 7.88 earnings per share for the current year.

IDEX Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 17th will be paid a $0.69 dividend. This represents a $2.76 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.24%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 17th. IDEX’s payout ratio is currently 42.72%.

IDEX Company Profile

IDEX Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides applied solutions worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Fluid & Metering Technologies (FMT), Health & Science Technologies (HST), and Fire & Safety/Diversified Products (FSDP). The FMT segment designs, produces, and distributes positive displacement pumps, valves, small volume provers, flow meters, injectors, and other fluid-handling pump modules and systems, as well as flow monitoring and other services for the food, chemical, general industrial, water and wastewater, agricultural, and energy industries.