Morgan Stanley Direct Lending (NYSE:MSDL) Receives $21.58 Consensus Target Price from Brokerages

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending (NYSE:MSDL) has received an average recommendation of “Hold” from the six analysts that are presently covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Five investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation and one has issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year target price among analysts that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $21.58.

Separately, Wells Fargo & Company increased their price target on shares of Morgan Stanley Direct Lending from $20.00 to $21.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 29th.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Van ECK Associates Corp lifted its position in Morgan Stanley Direct Lending by 3.9% during the fourth quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,922,174 shares of the company’s stock valued at $39,712,000 after purchasing an additional 71,855 shares during the period. Activest Wealth Management raised its position in Morgan Stanley Direct Lending by 102.9% in the fourth quarter. Activest Wealth Management now owns 164,060 shares of the company’s stock worth $3,389,000 after acquiring an additional 83,217 shares during the period. Americana Partners LLC bought a new position in Morgan Stanley Direct Lending in the fourth quarter worth approximately $2,819,000. Raymond James & Associates raised its position in Morgan Stanley Direct Lending by 377.5% in the third quarter. Raymond James & Associates now owns 123,822 shares of the company’s stock worth $2,449,000 after acquiring an additional 97,893 shares during the period. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. bought a new position in Morgan Stanley Direct Lending in the fourth quarter worth approximately $2,110,000.

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE:MSDL opened at $21.01 on Wednesday. The company has a market cap of $1.86 billion and a price-to-earnings ratio of 8.24. The company has a 50-day moving average price of $21.00 and a 200-day moving average price of $20.37. The company has a current ratio of 1.56, a quick ratio of 1.56 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.99. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending has a 12 month low of $19.05 and a 12 month high of $24.18.

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending (NYSE:MSDL) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, November 7th. The company reported $0.66 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.65 by $0.01. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending had a net margin of 54.89% and a return on equity of 12.69%. The company had revenue of $109.75 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $107.55 million. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that Morgan Stanley Direct Lending will post 2.56 EPS for the current year.

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Cuts Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a — dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 24th. Investors of record on Tuesday, December 31st were given a dividend of $0.10 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, December 31st. This represents a yield of 10.1%. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 78.43%.

About Morgan Stanley Direct Lending

Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is a business development company. It is a non-diversified, externally managed specialty finance company focused on lending to middle-market companies. Morgan Stanley Direct Lending Fund is based in NEW YORK.