Headlands Technologies LLC Sells 331 Shares of MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX)

Headlands Technologies LLC decreased its holdings in MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) by 10.7% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,758 shares of the financial services provider’s stock after selling 331 shares during the quarter. Headlands Technologies LLC’s holdings in MarketAxess were worth $623,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also modified their holdings of the stock. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its position in MarketAxess by 3.4% in the 4th quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,113,308 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $251,106,000 after buying an additional 36,431 shares during the last quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. boosted its position in MarketAxess by 274.4% during the 4th quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 30,753 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $6,951,000 after acquiring an additional 22,538 shares during the last quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of MarketAxess by 50.2% in the 4th quarter. O Shaughnessy Asset Management LLC now owns 3,294 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $745,000 after acquiring an additional 1,101 shares in the last quarter. California Public Employees Retirement System grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 15.0% in the fourth quarter. California Public Employees Retirement System now owns 62,605 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $14,151,000 after buying an additional 8,164 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Schroder Investment Management Group increased its position in MarketAxess by 1.2% during the fourth quarter. Schroder Investment Management Group now owns 92,136 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $20,758,000 after buying an additional 1,057 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 99.01% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

MKTX has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Barclays reduced their price objective on MarketAxess from $256.00 to $225.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, February 7th. UBS Group decreased their price target on MarketAxess from $330.00 to $305.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, February 7th. The Goldman Sachs Group lowered their price objective on shares of MarketAxess from $235.00 to $210.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, February 10th. Bank of America boosted their price target on MarketAxess from $189.00 to $191.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a report on Wednesday. Finally, Piper Sandler lowered their target price on MarketAxess from $265.00 to $240.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, January 7th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have given a hold rating and two have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $255.44.

MarketAxess Price Performance

NASDAQ:MKTX opened at $210.83 on Thursday. The company has a market cap of $7.95 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.00, a P/E/G ratio of 3.89 and a beta of 1.05. MarketAxess Holdings Inc. has a 1 year low of $186.84 and a 1 year high of $296.68. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $207.07 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $238.18.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The financial services provider reported $1.73 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.70 by $0.03. MarketAxess had a return on equity of 20.23% and a net margin of 33.56%. On average, analysts expect that MarketAxess Holdings Inc. will post 7.79 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

MarketAxess Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 5th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, February 19th were paid a $0.76 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, February 19th. This is a boost from MarketAxess’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.74. This represents a $3.04 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.44%. MarketAxess’s dividend payout ratio is currently 41.82%.

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.