Madison Investment Advisors LLC Acquires Shares of 1,164,887 Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC)

Madison Investment Advisors LLC bought a new position in Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund bought 1,164,887 shares of the asset manager’s stock, valued at approximately $86,062,000. Madison Investment Advisors LLC owned approximately 1.55% of Moelis & Company as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

Several other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of MC. Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new stake in Moelis & Company in the 4th quarter valued at $27,855,000. Fisher Asset Management LLC grew its position in shares of Moelis & Company by 252.8% during the fourth quarter. Fisher Asset Management LLC now owns 220,770 shares of the asset manager’s stock valued at $16,310,000 after purchasing an additional 158,200 shares in the last quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC bought a new stake in shares of Moelis & Company in the fourth quarter worth about $10,158,000. Hodges Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Moelis & Company in the fourth quarter worth about $9,149,000. Finally, Pier Capital LLC bought a new position in Moelis & Company during the third quarter valued at approximately $8,152,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 91.53% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

MC has been the topic of a number of research reports. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Moelis & Company from $77.00 to $83.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 6th. Morgan Stanley raised their target price on shares of Moelis & Company from $95.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 6th. StockNews.com downgraded shares of Moelis & Company from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday, February 21st. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price objective on shares of Moelis & Company from $79.00 to $87.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 6th. Finally, JMP Securities restated a “market perform” rating on shares of Moelis & Company in a report on Thursday, February 6th. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, five have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Moelis & Company has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $78.83.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Moelis & Company news, General Counsel Osamu R. Watanabe sold 5,661 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.00, for a total value of $418,914.00. Following the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 6,471 shares in the company, valued at $478,854. This represents a 46.66 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Christopher Callesano sold 1,282 shares of Moelis & Company stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 19th. The shares were sold at an average price of $74.00, for a total transaction of $94,868.00. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 1,227 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $90,798. This represents a 51.10 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last three months, insiders sold 22,721 shares of company stock valued at $1,677,017. Insiders own 6.40% of the company’s stock.

Moelis & Company Stock Up 0.6 %

MC stock opened at $60.17 on Thursday. Moelis & Company has a twelve month low of $46.24 and a twelve month high of $82.89. The stock has a market capitalization of $4.51 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.19 and a beta of 1.43. The firm’s fifty day simple moving average is $73.49 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $71.87.

Moelis & Company (NYSE:MC) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 5th. The asset manager reported $1.18 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.39 by $0.79. Moelis & Company had a net margin of 11.39% and a return on equity of 38.49%. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Moelis & Company will post 2.97 EPS for the current year.

Moelis & Company Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 27th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, February 18th will be issued a $0.65 dividend. This represents a $2.60 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 4.32%. This is an increase from Moelis & Company’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.60. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, February 18th. Moelis & Company’s dividend payout ratio is presently 147.73%.

Moelis & Company Profile

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.