MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) Increases Dividend to $0.76 Per Share

MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX - Get Free Report) declared a quarterly dividend on Thursday, January 23rd,Wall Street Journal reports. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, February 19th will be given a dividend of 0.76 per share by the financial services provider on Wednesday, March 5th. This represents a $3.04 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.56%. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, February 19th. This is a boost from MarketAxess's previous quarterly dividend of $0.74.

MarketAxess has raised its dividend by an average of 3.9% per year over the last three years. MarketAxess has a dividend payout ratio of 34.7% indicating that its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Analysts expect MarketAxess to earn $9.10 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $3.04 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 33.4%.

MarketAxess Trading Down 0.5 %

NASDAQ:MKTX traded down $0.93 during midday trading on Tuesday, reaching $195.27. The company had a trading volume of 557,445 shares, compared to its average volume of 519,024. The stock's fifty day simple moving average is $223.92 and its 200-day simple moving average is $246.83. MarketAxess has a 12-month low of $191.91 and a 12-month high of $296.68. The firm has a market capitalization of $7.36 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.86, a PEG ratio of 4.08 and a beta of 1.02.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX - Get Free Report) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The financial services provider reported $1.73 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.70 by $0.03. MarketAxess had a net margin of 33.56% and a return on equity of 20.23%. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that MarketAxess will post 8.05 EPS for the current year.

Insider Transactions at MarketAxess

In other MarketAxess news, Chairman Richard M. Mcvey sold 10,000 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Thursday, November 14th. The shares were sold at an average price of $267.67, for a total value of $2,676,700.00. Following the transaction, the chairman now directly owns 562,029 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $150,438,302.43. The trade was a 1.75 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, General Counsel Scott Pintoff sold 300 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Monday, December 9th. The shares were sold at an average price of $240.57, for a total transaction of $72,171.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the general counsel now directly owns 8,302 shares in the company, valued at $1,997,212.14. This represents a 3.49 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 2.66% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several analysts recently weighed in on MKTX shares. Barclays reduced their target price on shares of MarketAxess from $256.00 to $225.00 and set an "equal weight" rating on the stock in a report on Friday. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $262.00 to $314.00 and gave the company an "equal weight" rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. The Goldman Sachs Group dropped their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $235.00 to $210.00 and set a "neutral" rating on the stock in a research note on Monday. UBS Group dropped their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $330.00 to $305.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods dropped their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $251.00 to $225.00 and set a "market perform" rating on the stock in a research note on Friday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, seven have assigned a hold rating and two have given a buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $254.78.

MarketAxess Company Profile

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.