Morgan Stanley (NYSE:MS) has recently earned a moderate buy recommendation from seventeen research firms, according to Bloomberg.com. One of these firms has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, while seven have issued hold recommendations, eight have given a buy recommendation, and one has assigned a strong buy recommendation to the company. These ratings provide average 12-month price objectives among brokerages that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year, with an average objective of $95.34.
The financial services provider recently released its quarterly earnings data on April 19th. Morgan Stanley reported revenue of $14.52 billion for the quarter, exceeding analyst estimates of $13.96 billion, and earning $1.70 EPS which also beat expectations of $1.67 by three cents.
While the group’s revenue was down slightly compared to the same quarter last year, analysts anticipate that Morgan Stanley will post 6.5 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.
Several institutional investors and hedge funds have made significant changes to their positions in MS in recent months. For instance, Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings in Morgan Stanley by 2% during the first quarter adding another 913,447 shares bringing its total holdings to over 46 million shares worth roughly $4 billion. Similarly,Fisher Asset Management LLC increased its stake by 314,567 shares during Q1-2021; while institutions own around 84% of Morgan Stanley’s publicly traded shares.
The positive reception from investors and analysts alike is indicative of Morgan Stanley’s position as a leading financial services provider and highlights their ability to adapt in an ever-changing economic environment. As such, it comes as no surprise that Morgan Stanley continues to maintain its position as one of the most sought-after investment opportunities on the market today due to impressive performances under challenging conditions and rapid technological advancements within modern financial ecosystems over recent years.
Morgan Stanley Receives Moderate Buy Recommendation from Seventeen Firms
Morgan Stanley (NYSE: MS) has been generating noteworthy interest from market analysts over the past few months. A variety of ratings have been given to the financial services provider by different firms, indicating positive and negative outlooks on the company. Oppenheimer upped their target price from $95.00 to $103.00 and gave an “outperform” rating in April whereas Royal Bank of Canada lowered their price objective from $90.00 to $80.00 and set a “sector perform” rating in March. Barclays also lowered their Morgan Stanley price objective and gave it an “overweight” rating while Wells Fargo & Company decreased their target price from $89.00 to $85.00 and gave it an “equal weight” rating in April.
However, despite the varied analyst opinions on Morgan Stanley, NYSE:MS opened at $83.58 last Friday with a market capitalization of $139,590 million and a P/E ratio of 14.36, a PEG ratio of 1.88, and a beta of 1.35. Its current ratio is 0.79, quick ratio is 0.79, and the debt-to-equity ratio is at present 2.68, indicating lower liquidity compared to other financial service providers in the industry.
Furthermore, institutional investors such as Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings by two percent for the first quarter while FMR LLC increased its stake by more than six percent during this period.
Despite what analysts say or do not say about Morgan Stanley’s performance within the industry at large, data revealed that last May’s quarterly dividend was issued on May 15th for shareholders who invested before May 1st where they received a payout of $0.775 per share or equivalent to an annualized yield of 3..71% dividend payout yielding ratio is currently at present almost fifty-four percent which bodes well for dividend investors.
In other news, Morgan Stanley’s major shareholder Stanley Morgan sold more than one million shares of stock at an average price of $9.45, which are currently valued at $79,917,525.45 while Director Thomas H. Glocer sold 4,535 shares for a total transaction of $395,043.85.
Overall, Morgan Stanley’s varied ratings from analysts and the recent adjustments made by its major shareholders both positive and negative serve only to showcase the complexity of such dealings in the financial services industry.
Source: beststocks.com
