Legato Capital Management LLC Invests $937,000 in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. $MKTX

Legato Capital Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund purchased 5,168 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $937,000.

Several other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of MKTX. Primecap Management Co. CA lifted its holdings in MarketAxess by 66.6% in the third quarter. Primecap Management Co. CA now owns 2,230,595 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $388,681,000 after purchasing an additional 891,303 shares during the period. AQR Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in MarketAxess by 485.6% in the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 758,462 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $167,195,000 after purchasing an additional 628,954 shares during the period. North Reef Capital Management LP lifted its holdings in MarketAxess by 117.0% in the third quarter. North Reef Capital Management LP now owns 911,358 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $158,804,000 after purchasing an additional 491,358 shares during the period. BNP Paribas Financial Markets lifted its holdings in MarketAxess by 469.1% in the third quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 486,106 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $84,704,000 after purchasing an additional 400,691 shares during the period. Finally, Burgundy Asset Management Ltd. lifted its holdings in MarketAxess by 67.1% in the third quarter. Burgundy Asset Management Ltd. now owns 692,216 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $127,257,000 after purchasing an additional 277,846 shares during the period. Institutional investors own 99.01% of the company’s stock.

MarketAxess Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ MKTX opened at $137.13 on Tuesday. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a twelve month low of $135.00 and a twelve month high of $228.16. The company has a current ratio of 2.17, a quick ratio of 2.17 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.19. The company has a market capitalization of $4.87 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 16.21, a PEG ratio of 2.64 and a beta of 0.92. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $161.18 and a two-hundred day moving average of $169.79.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 7th. The financial services provider reported $2.25 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.15 by $0.10. MarketAxess had a net margin of 35.53% and a return on equity of 22.28%. The company had revenue of $233.38 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $231.91 million. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $1.87 EPS. MarketAxess’s revenue was up 11.9% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 8.04 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MarketAxess Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, June 3rd. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, May 20th will be issued a $0.78 dividend. This represents a $3.12 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, May 20th. MarketAxess’s dividend payout ratio is presently 36.88%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities research analysts recently weighed in on MKTX shares. UBS Group reduced their price objective on shares of MarketAxess from $225.00 to $215.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Monday, May 11th. Barclays reduced their price objective on shares of MarketAxess from $189.00 to $170.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Monday, May 11th. Wall Street Zen raised shares of MarketAxess from a “sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Saturday, February 7th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods started coverage on shares of MarketAxess in a report on Wednesday, April 8th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $195.00 price objective for the company. Finally, Weiss Ratings downgraded shares of MarketAxess from a “hold (c-)” rating to a “sell (d+)” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating, six have assigned a Hold rating and one has assigned a Sell rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $190.88.

MarketAxess Company Profile

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.