MSCI Inc. (MSCI) to Issue Quarterly Dividend of $1.60 on November 29th

MSCI Inc. (NYSE:MSCI) declared a quarterly dividend on Monday, October 28th,Zacks Dividends reports. Stockholders of record on Friday, November 15th will be paid a dividend of 1.60 per share by the technology company on Friday, November 29th. This represents a $6.40 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.06%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, November 15th.

MSCI has increased its dividend by an average of 23.7% per year over the last three years. MSCI has a payout ratio of 37.6% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Equities analysts expect MSCI to earn $16.95 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $6.40 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 37.8%.

MSCI Trading Up 0.9 %

NYSE MSCI opened at $602.64 on Wednesday. The stock has a market capitalization of $47.23 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 39.57, a PEG ratio of 3.10 and a beta of 1.11. MSCI has a twelve month low of $439.95 and a twelve month high of $631.70. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $580.91 and a 200 day moving average of $534.64.

MSCI (NYSE:MSCI) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, October 29th. The technology company reported $3.86 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.77 by $0.09. MSCI had a negative return on equity of 162.06% and a net margin of 43.06%. The company had revenue of $724.70 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $716.15 million. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $3.45 EPS. MSCI’s quarterly revenue was up 15.9% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts predict that MSCI will post 14.98 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have commented on MSCI. Morgan Stanley boosted their price objective on MSCI from $640.00 to $662.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 30th. Barclays boosted their price objective on MSCI from $650.00 to $700.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, September 13th. Argus upped their price target on MSCI from $520.00 to $600.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, July 26th. UBS Group dropped their price target on MSCI from $695.00 to $680.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Evercore ISI began coverage on MSCI in a research report on Wednesday, October 2nd. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $690.00 price target for the company. 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.com, MSCI presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $631.83.

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.