JPMorgan Chase & Co. Raises Position in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. $MKTX

JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted its stake in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) by 6.9% in the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 447,925 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after buying an additional 28,881 shares during the period. JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s holdings in MarketAxess were worth $78,051,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors have also recently modified their holdings of the stock. MUFG Securities EMEA plc purchased a new stake in MarketAxess during the 2nd quarter valued at $25,000. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. lifted its position in MarketAxess by 200.0% in the first quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 120 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $26,000 after buying an additional 80 shares during the last quarter. Pilgrim Partners Asia Pte Ltd purchased a new position in MarketAxess during the third quarter worth $38,000. Stance Capital LLC purchased a new position in MarketAxess during the third quarter worth $42,000. Finally, Abich Financial Wealth Management LLC bought a new position in MarketAxess during the third quarter valued at $43,000. Institutional investors own 99.01% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

MKTX has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Wall Street Zen raised shares of MarketAxess from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Saturday, February 7th. Barclays dropped their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $182.00 to $178.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 9th. UBS Group cut their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $240.00 to $225.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, January 9th. Argus downgraded shares of MarketAxess from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday. Finally, Weiss Ratings upgraded MarketAxess from a “sell (d+)” rating to a “hold (c-)” rating in a research report on Tuesday, February 10th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, eight have assigned a Hold rating and one has given a Sell rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $200.40.

MarketAxess Trading Down 2.5%

NASDAQ:MKTX opened at $174.63 on Thursday. The firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $176.33 and a 200-day simple moving average of $174.68. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a one year low of $156.17 and a one year high of $232.84. The firm has a market cap of $6.21 billion, a P/E ratio of 26.22, a P/E/G ratio of 2.97 and a beta of 0.93. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19, a quick ratio of 2.80 and a current ratio of 2.80.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last posted its earnings results on Friday, February 6th. The financial services provider reported $1.68 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.72 by ($0.04). The company had revenue of $209.41 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $214.06 million. MarketAxess had a return on equity of 20.88% and a net margin of 29.14%.The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 3.5% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company earned $1.73 EPS. Equities analysts anticipate that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 7.79 EPS for the current fiscal year.

MarketAxess Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 4th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, February 18th were given a $0.78 dividend. This represents a $3.12 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, February 18th. This is a positive change from MarketAxess’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.76. MarketAxess’s dividend payout ratio is presently 46.85%.

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.