MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) Receives Consensus Recommendation of “Hold” from Brokerages

Shares of MarketAxess Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:MKTX) have received an average recommendation of “Hold” from the thirteen ratings firms that are currently covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eight have assigned a hold rating and four have given a buy rating to the company. The average 1-year target price among brokers that have issued ratings on the stock in the last year is $201.6364.

A number of research firms recently issued reports on MKTX. UBS Group reduced their price objective on MarketAxess from $240.00 to $225.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Friday, January 9th. Zacks Research upgraded MarketAxess from a “strong sell” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Tuesday, November 18th. Keefe, Bruyette & Woods boosted their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $194.00 to $198.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Monday, November 10th. Argus lowered their price target on shares of MarketAxess from $212.00 to $205.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, December 17th. Finally, Loop Capital set a $164.00 price objective on shares of MarketAxess in a research report on Tuesday, October 14th.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On MarketAxess

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Primecap Management Co. CA grew its holdings in MarketAxess by 66.6% in the 3rd quarter. Primecap Management Co. CA now owns 2,230,595 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $388,681,000 after buying an additional 891,303 shares in the last quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp raised its stake in MarketAxess by 6.5% during the 3rd quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 1,948,633 shares of the financial services provider’s stock valued at $339,549,000 after acquiring an additional 119,036 shares in the last quarter. State Street Corp boosted its position in MarketAxess by 4.6% during the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 1,532,696 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $342,312,000 after acquiring an additional 67,290 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 0.6% in the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 1,141,198 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $254,460,000 after purchasing an additional 6,448 shares in the last quarter. Finally, AQR Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of MarketAxess by 25.4% in the third quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 951,088 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $165,727,000 after purchasing an additional 192,626 shares in the last quarter. 99.01% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

MarketAxess Stock Down 0.1%

MKTX opened at $171.52 on Friday. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $173.28 and its 200 day moving average price is $180.68. MarketAxess has a fifty-two week low of $156.17 and a fifty-two week high of $232.84. The firm has a market cap of $6.38 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.17, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 4.34 and a beta of 0.97.

MarketAxess (NASDAQ:MKTX) last issued its earnings results on Friday, November 7th. The financial services provider reported $1.84 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.69 by $0.15. The company had revenue of $208.82 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $212.59 million. MarketAxess had a return on equity of 20.20% and a net margin of 26.16%.MarketAxess’s quarterly revenue was up 1.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm posted $1.90 earnings per share. Research analysts anticipate that MarketAxess will post 7.79 earnings per share for the current year.

About MarketAxess

MarketAxess Holdings Inc operates a leading global electronic trading platform specializing in fixed-income securities and related products. The company’s network enables institutional investors and broker-dealers to trade corporate bonds, municipal securities, emerging markets debt, U.S. Treasuries and credit default swaps in an automated, multi-dealer environment. MarketAxess also offers portfolio trading, data analytics, best-execution tools and post-trade services to streamline workflows and enhance price discovery across its marketplace.

In addition to core voice-like trading protocols, MarketAxess provides Open Trading®, an anonymous, all-to-all trading protocol designed to improve liquidity and transaction efficiency.