Royal Bank of Canada Raises Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK) Price Target to $300.00

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK) had its price target raised by Royal Bank of Canada from $268.00 to $300.00 in a report released on Thursday, Marketbeat reports. Royal Bank of Canada currently has an outperform rating on the business services provider’s stock.

A number of other equities analysts have also recently issued reports on the stock. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on shares of Verisk Analytics from $280.00 to $282.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 1st. BMO Capital Markets cut their price target on shares of Verisk Analytics from $278.00 to $263.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, August 1st. Evercore ISI restated an “in-line” rating and issued a $279.00 price objective on shares of Verisk Analytics in a report on Wednesday, October 2nd. Morgan Stanley lifted their target price on shares of Verisk Analytics from $243.00 to $260.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 31st. Finally, Robert W. Baird increased their price target on shares of Verisk Analytics from $268.00 to $285.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 1st. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, five have given a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $278.67.

Verisk Analytics Trading Up 0.1 %

Shares of VRSK opened at $267.62 on Thursday. Verisk Analytics has a fifty-two week low of $215.32 and a fifty-two week high of $287.13. The firm has a market cap of $38.18 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 49.93, a PEG ratio of 3.42 and a beta of 0.86. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $268.88 and a 200-day moving average price of $259.53. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 5.86, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a current ratio of 0.95.

Verisk Analytics (NASDAQ:VRSK) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The business services provider reported $1.74 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.64 by $0.10. Verisk Analytics had a return on equity of 252.11% and a net margin of 32.03%. The business had revenue of $716.80 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $722.45 million. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $1.51 EPS. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 6.2% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, equities research analysts forecast that Verisk Analytics will post 6.57 earnings per share for the current year.

Verisk Analytics Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 30th. Investors of record on Sunday, September 15th were given a dividend of $0.39 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, September 13th. This represents a $1.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.58%. Verisk Analytics’s dividend payout ratio is 29.10%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CFO Elizabeth Mann sold 200 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, October 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $271.33, for a total transaction of $54,266.00. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 15,808 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,289,184.64. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 0.40% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of the company. International Assets Investment Management LLC purchased a new stake in Verisk Analytics in the second quarter worth about $31,000. Chilton Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Verisk Analytics during the second quarter valued at approximately $34,000. OFI Invest Asset Management bought a new stake in Verisk Analytics during the first quarter valued at about $28,000. Rothschild Investment LLC purchased a new position in Verisk Analytics in the second quarter valued at about $41,000. Finally, Riverview Trust Co bought a new position in Verisk Analytics in the first quarter worth about $40,000. 90.00% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Verisk Analytics

Verisk Analytics, Inc provides data analytics and technology solutions to the insurance markets in the United States and internationally. It offers policy language, prospective loss costs, policy writing and rating rules, and various underwriting solutions for risk selection and segmentation, pricing, and workflow optimization; property- and auto- specific rating and underwriting information solutions that allows clients to understand, quantify, underwrite, mitigate, and avoid potential loss for risks; catastrophe modeling solutions, which enables companies to identify, quantify, and plan for the financial consequences of catastrophes for use by insurers, reinsurers, intermediaries, financial institutions, and governments.