First Hawaiian Bank Buys New Stake in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX)

First Hawaiian Bank purchased a new position in shares of MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm purchased 4,815 shares of the financial services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $1,088,000.

Other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Accent Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in MarketAxess during the third quarter worth about $25,000. Goodman Advisory Group LLC purchased a new position in shares of MarketAxess during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $27,000. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC purchased a new stake in MarketAxess during the third quarter worth $54,000. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt grew its position in MarketAxess by 555.6% during the third quarter. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt now owns 236 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $60,000 after buying an additional 200 shares during the period. Finally, Assetmark Inc. increased its holdings in MarketAxess by 160.3% in the third quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 380 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $97,000 after buying an additional 234 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 99.01% of the company’s stock.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other MarketAxess news, General Counsel Scott Pintoff sold 300 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $240.57, for a total transaction of $72,171.00. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now owns 8,302 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,997,212.14. This trade represents a 3.49 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, Chairman Richard M. Mcvey sold 20,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, November 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $271.75, for a total value of $5,435,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chairman now directly owns 592,029 shares in the company, valued at approximately $160,883,880.75. This trade represents a 3.27 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 30,300 shares of company stock worth $8,183,871. Insiders own 2.66% of the company’s stock.

MarketAxess Trading Up 0.2 %

Shares of NASDAQ MKTX opened at $219.60 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $8.28 billion, a PE ratio of 29.76, a P/E/G ratio of 9.49 and a beta of 1.03. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a 12-month low of $192.42 and a 12-month high of $296.68. The company has a 50-day moving average of $249.54 and a 200 day moving average of $245.50.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The financial services provider reported $1.90 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.85 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $206.70 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $207.17 million. MarketAxess had a return on equity of 20.93% and a net margin of 34.32%. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 20.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the firm earned $1.46 earnings per share. On average, sell-side analysts forecast that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 7.38 EPS for the current fiscal year.

MarketAxess Dividend Announcement

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, December 4th. Investors of record on Wednesday, November 20th were issued a $0.74 dividend. This represents a $2.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.35%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, November 20th. MarketAxess’s dividend payout ratio is currently 40.11%.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

MKTX has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. Piper Sandler dropped their target price on MarketAxess from $265.00 to $240.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods dropped their price objective on MarketAxess from $276.00 to $255.00 and set a “market perform” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, December 20th. Bank of America decreased their target price on MarketAxess from $193.00 to $185.00 and set an “underperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, October 3rd. The Goldman Sachs Group boosted their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $204.00 to $233.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Monday, September 30th. Finally, Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft lifted their target price on shares of MarketAxess from $258.00 to $264.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Monday, November 11th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $262.10.

About MarketAxess

MarketAxess Holdings Inc, together with its subsidiaries, operates an electronic trading platform for institutional investor and broker-dealer companies worldwide. The company offers trading technology that provides liquidity access in U.S. high-grade bonds, U.S. high-yield bonds, emerging market debt, eurobonds, municipal bonds, U.S.