Korn Ferry (NYSE:KFY) Lifted to Buy at StockNews.com

StockNews.com upgraded shares of Korn Ferry (NYSE:KFY) from a hold rating to a buy rating in a research note published on Thursday morning.

Several other research firms also recently weighed in on KFY. William Blair raised Korn Ferry from a market perform rating to an outperform rating in a research report on Thursday, February 29th. Truist Financial reissued a buy rating and set a $78.00 target price (up previously from $74.00) on shares of Korn Ferry in a research report on Friday, June 14th. UBS Group boosted their target price on Korn Ferry from $66.00 to $68.00 and gave the company a neutral rating in a research report on Friday, June 7th. Finally, Robert W. Baird boosted their price objective on Korn Ferry from $72.00 to $79.00 and gave the company an outperform rating in a report on Friday, June 14th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating and four have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Korn Ferry has an average rating of Moderate Buy and an average price target of $75.00.

Korn Ferry Stock Performance

NYSE:KFY opened at $68.09 on Thursday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.23, a current ratio of 1.79 and a quick ratio of 1.83. Korn Ferry has a 1 year low of $44.45 and a 1 year high of $70.78. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $64.01 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $61.34. The company has a market cap of $3.58 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.15 and a beta of 1.48.

Korn Ferry (NYSE:KFY) last released its earnings results on Thursday, June 13th. The business services provider reported $1.26 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.13 by $0.13. The firm had revenue of $690.80 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $687.36 million. Korn Ferry had a return on equity of 13.18% and a net margin of 6.05%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was down 5.5% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $1.01 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Korn Ferry will post 4.86 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Korn Ferry Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 31st. Investors of record on Wednesday, July 3rd will be issued a dividend of $0.37 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, July 3rd. This represents a $1.48 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 2.17%. This is a boost from Korn Ferry’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.33. Korn Ferry’s payout ratio is presently 40.99%.

Insider Activity at Korn Ferry

In related news, CEO Mark Arian sold 5,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, June 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $66.01, for a total transaction of $330,050.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 91,484 shares in the company, valued at approximately $6,038,858.84. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. 1.50% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Korn Ferry

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. SummerHaven Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Korn Ferry by 1.4% in the 4th quarter. SummerHaven Investment Management LLC now owns 13,925 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $826,000 after buying an additional 188 shares during the period. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Korn Ferry by 13.4% in the 4th quarter. Nisa Investment Advisors LLC now owns 2,540 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $151,000 after buying an additional 301 shares during the period. GAMMA Investing LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Korn Ferry by 40.1% in the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 1,086 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $71,000 after buying an additional 311 shares during the period. Azzad Asset Management Inc. ADV lifted its holdings in shares of Korn Ferry by 2.5% in the 1st quarter. Azzad Asset Management Inc. ADV now owns 14,548 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $957,000 after buying an additional 360 shares during the period. Finally, QRG Capital Management Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Korn Ferry by 3.1% during the 1st quarter. QRG Capital Management Inc. now owns 13,183 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $867,000 after purchasing an additional 391 shares during the last quarter. 98.82% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

About Korn Ferry

Korn Ferry, together with its subsidiaries, provides organizational consulting services worldwide. It operates through four segments: Consulting, Digital, Executive Search, and Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) & Professional Search. The company provides executive search services to recruit board level, chief executive, other senior executive, and general management talent of organizations.