Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO) Short Interest Up 43.5% in February

Moody’s Co. (NYSE:MCO) was the recipient of a significant increase in short interest in the month of February. As of February 28th, there was short interest totalling 2,740,000 shares, an increase of 43.5% from the February 13th total of 1,910,000 shares. Currently, 1.5% of the shares of the company are sold short. Based on an average daily volume of 740,000 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is presently 3.7 days.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Moody’s news, CEO Robert Fauber sold 281 shares of Moody’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $473.62, for a total transaction of $133,087.22. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now directly owns 61,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $29,314,236.28. This trade represents a 0.45 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Insiders sold a total of 1,124 shares of company stock valued at $552,193 over the last ninety days. 0.14% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Moody’s

Several institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of MCO. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Moody’s in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $988,750,000. FMR LLC lifted its stake in Moody’s by 12.3% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 6,581,036 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $3,123,294,000 after acquiring an additional 723,226 shares in the last quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC lifted its stake in Moody’s by 92,060.2% in the 4th quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC now owns 612,865 shares of the business services provider’s stock valued at $290,112,000 after acquiring an additional 612,200 shares in the last quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA increased its position in shares of Moody’s by 32.0% during the 3rd quarter. Massachusetts Financial Services Co. MA now owns 2,075,719 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $985,115,000 after purchasing an additional 502,891 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Amundi increased its position in shares of Moody’s by 73.6% during the 4th quarter. Amundi now owns 1,131,656 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $534,255,000 after purchasing an additional 479,599 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.11% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have issued reports on MCO. StockNews.com cut Moody’s from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, March 7th. Morgan Stanley lifted their price objective on Moody’s from $481.00 to $508.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, February 14th. UBS Group lifted their price objective on Moody’s from $510.00 to $540.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, February 18th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price objective on Moody’s from $459.00 to $533.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, February 14th. Finally, Oppenheimer raised their target price on Moody’s from $543.00 to $545.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Moody’s has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $527.00.

Moody’s Price Performance

Shares of MCO stock opened at $446.67 on Friday. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $486.63 and a 200 day moving average price of $481.42. The company has a quick ratio of 1.67, a current ratio of 1.47 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.81. The firm has a market cap of $80.35 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 39.63, a PEG ratio of 2.87 and a beta of 1.34. Moody’s has a 12 month low of $360.05 and a 12 month high of $531.93.

Moody’s (NYSE:MCO) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 13th. The business services provider reported $2.62 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.27 by $0.35. Moody’s had a return on equity of 58.94% and a net margin of 29.03%. The firm had revenue of $1.67 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $1.70 billion. Research analysts expect that Moody’s will post 13.95 EPS for the current year.

Moody’s Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 14th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, February 25th were issued a dividend of $0.94 per share. The ex-dividend date was Tuesday, February 25th. This represents a $3.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.84%. This is a boost from Moody’s’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.85. Moody’s’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 33.36%.

About Moody’s

Moody’s Corporation operates as an integrated risk assessment firm worldwide. It operates in two segments, Moody’s Analytics and Moody’s Investors Services. The Moody’s Analytics segment develops a range of products and services that support the risk management activities of institutional participants in financial markets.