Man Group plc Invests $1.59 Million in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. $MKTX

Man Group plc acquired a new stake in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) in the second quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm acquired 14,008 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,590,000.

Several other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in MKTX. Amundi grew its holdings in MarketAxess by 803.9% in the 1st quarter. Amundi now owns 258,708 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $42,682,000 after buying an additional 230,087 shares during the period. Hsbc Holdings PLC increased its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 638.7% during the 1st quarter. Hsbc Holdings PLC now owns 21,009 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $3,472,000 after acquiring an additional 18,165 shares during the last quarter. Legal & General Group Plc purchased a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 2nd quarter worth about $9,585,000. Bank of America Corp DE lifted its holdings in shares of MarketAxess by 32.4% during the 1st quarter. Bank of America Corp DE now owns 263,858 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $43,531,000 after acquiring an additional 64,627 shares during the period. Finally, BlackRock Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of MarketAxess in the second quarter worth approximately $453,941,000. 99.01% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently commented on MKTX. UBS Group lowered shares of MarketAxess from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $200.00 to $167.00 in a research report on Friday, July 31st. Barclays lifted their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $132.00 to $167.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Monday, August 10th. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on MarketAxess from $195.00 to $129.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, July 10th. The Goldman Sachs Group cut their target price on MarketAxess from $168.00 to $130.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, June 30th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reiterated a “sell (d+)” rating on shares of MarketAxess in a report on Monday, August 3rd. One analyst has rated the stock with a Buy rating, eleven have issued a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $156.10.

MarketAxess Trading Up 0.1%

Shares of MKTX stock opened at $162.83 on Thursday. The stock has a market cap of $5.73 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.20, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.07 and a beta of 0.83. The company has a quick ratio of 1.85, a current ratio of 1.85 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.09. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $108.75 and a fifty-two week high of $195.96. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $138.93 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $150.36.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, July 30th. The financial services provider reported $1.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.10. MarketAxess had a net margin of 35.22% and a return on equity of 22.48%. The company had revenue of $218.41 million during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $216.70 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $2.00 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was down .5% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, analysts anticipate that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 8.06 EPS for the current year.

MarketAxess Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 2nd. Investors of record on Wednesday, August 19th were issued a $0.78 dividend. This represents a $3.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.9%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, August 19th. MarketAxess’s dividend payout ratio is currently 36.79%.

About MarketAxess

MarketAxess Holdings Inc operates a leading global electronic trading platform specializing in fixed-income securities and related products. The company’s network enables institutional investors and broker-dealers to trade corporate bonds, municipal securities, emerging markets debt, U.S. Treasuries and credit default swaps in an automated, multi-dealer environment. MarketAxess also offers portfolio trading, data analytics, best-execution tools and post-trade services to streamline workflows and enhance price discovery across its marketplace.

In addition to core voice-like trading protocols, MarketAxess provides Open Trading®, an anonymous, all-to-all trading protocol designed to improve liquidity and transaction efficiency.