Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) Trading Down 6.1% on Analyst Downgrade

Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) shares dropped 6.1% on Wednesday after Keefe, Bruyette & Woods lowered their price target on the stock from $69.00 to $66.00. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods currently has a market perform rating on the stock. Moelis & Company traded as low as $65.00 and last traded at $65.5540. Approximately 147,288 shares were traded during mid-day trading, a decline of 87% from the average daily volume of 1,119,079 shares. The stock had previously closed at $69.84.

Several other equities research analysts have also recently commented on MC. Morgan Stanley cut their price target on Moelis & Company from $90.00 to $83.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, April 9th. Weiss Ratings lowered Moelis & Company from a “hold (c+)” rating to a “hold (c)” rating in a research note on Tuesday, May 26th. Wall Street Zen cut Moelis & Company from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Saturday, May 2nd. The Goldman Sachs Group cut their target price on Moelis & Company from $70.00 to $62.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 1st. Finally, Zacks Research lowered Moelis & Company from a “hold” rating to a “strong sell” rating in a report on Tuesday, May 5th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, seven have assigned a Hold rating and two have given a Sell rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $72.33.

Institutional Trading of Moelis & Company

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in MC. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC raised its position in shares of Moelis & Company by 9.9% during the 1st quarter. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC now owns 4,799 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $280,000 after buying an additional 432 shares during the period. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. grew its position in Moelis & Company by 4.6% in the first quarter. MIRAE ASSET GLOBAL ETFS HOLDINGS Ltd. now owns 42,080 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $2,456,000 after acquiring an additional 1,839 shares during the period. United Services Automobile Association purchased a new position in Moelis & Company in the first quarter worth approximately $264,000. Empowered Funds LLC increased its stake in Moelis & Company by 37.6% during the first quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 42,828 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $2,499,000 after acquiring an additional 11,692 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Creative Planning increased its stake in Moelis & Company by 14.2% during the second quarter. Creative Planning now owns 6,639 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $414,000 after acquiring an additional 827 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 91.53% of the company’s stock.

Moelis & Company Stock Up 1.4%

The company has a market cap of $5.15 billion, a PE ratio of 23.56, a P/E/G ratio of 0.77 and a beta of 1.85. The stock has a 50-day simple moving average of $66.44 and a 200 day simple moving average of $65.82.

Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The asset manager reported $0.50 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.59 by ($0.09). The business had revenue of $319.78 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $321.51 million. Moelis & Company had a net margin of 14.46% and a return on equity of 38.94%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 4.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.64 EPS. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Moelis & Company will post 3.17 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Moelis & Company Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, June 18th. Shareholders of record on Monday, May 11th were given a $0.65 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, May 11th. This represents a $2.60 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 4.0%. Moelis & Company’s dividend payout ratio is presently 93.53%.

About Moelis & Company

Moelis & Co operates as a holding company. It engages in the provision of financial advisory, capital raising and asset management services to a client base including corporations, governments, sovereign wealth funds and financial sponsors. The firm focuses on clients including large public multinational corporations, middle market private companies, financial sponsors, entrepreneurs and governments. The company was founded by Kenneth David Moelis, Navid Mahmoodzadegan, Jeffrey Raich and Elizabeth Ann Crain in July 2007 and is headquartered in New York, NY.