Mather Group LLC. Purchases 330 Shares of Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO)

Mather Group LLC. lifted its position in shares of Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO) by 23.5% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 1,737 shares of the business services provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 330 shares during the period. Mather Group LLC.’s holdings in Moody’s were worth $678,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in MCO. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its stake in Moody’s by 0.6% in the 3rd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 13,974,432 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $4,418,296,000 after purchasing an additional 88,667 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC lifted its stake in Moody’s by 5.0% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 4,301,253 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $1,359,927,000 after purchasing an additional 205,800 shares during the last quarter. Rothschild & Co Wealth Management UK Ltd lifted its stake in Moody’s by 1.3% in the 3rd quarter. Rothschild & Co Wealth Management UK Ltd now owns 1,693,940 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $535,573,000 after purchasing an additional 21,145 shares during the last quarter. Northern Trust Corp increased its position in Moody’s by 3.7% in the 3rd quarter. Northern Trust Corp now owns 1,661,998 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $525,474,000 after acquiring an additional 59,476 shares during the period. Finally, Jennison Associates LLC increased its position in Moody’s by 0.3% in the 4th quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 1,515,430 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $591,867,000 after acquiring an additional 4,444 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 92.11% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have issued reports on the stock. Wells Fargo & Company decreased their price target on shares of Moody’s from $455.00 to $420.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Robert W. Baird decreased their price target on shares of Moody’s from $425.00 to $405.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Royal Bank of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $450.00 price target on shares of Moody’s in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. decreased their price target on shares of Moody’s from $420.00 to $410.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Finally, UBS Group upped their price target on shares of Moody’s from $355.00 to $380.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Wednesday, February 14th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, Moody’s presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $397.75.

Moody’s Trading Up 0.5 %

NYSE:MCO opened at $372.24 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 1.74, a quick ratio of 1.74 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.01. The stock has a market capitalization of $67.93 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 42.64, a PEG ratio of 2.96 and a beta of 1.27. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $384.18 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $372.80. Moody’s Co. has a 12 month low of $296.45 and a 12 month high of $407.62.

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 13th. The business services provider reported $2.19 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.33 by ($0.14). The company had revenue of $1.48 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.48 billion. Moody’s had a return on equity of 55.23% and a net margin of 27.16%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 14.7% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $1.60 earnings per share. Analysts expect that Moody’s Co. will post 10.77 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Moody’s Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 15th. Shareholders of record on Friday, February 23rd were paid a $0.85 dividend. This represents a $3.40 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.91%. This is a positive change from Moody’s’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.77. The ex-dividend date was Thursday, February 22nd. Moody’s’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 38.95%.

Moody’s Company 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.