Morgan Stanley Increases BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) Price Target to $1,025.00

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) had its price objective boosted by Morgan Stanley from $1,013.00 to $1,025.00 in a research note released on Monday morning, Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has an overweight rating on the asset manager’s stock.

BLK has been the subject of a number of other research reports. TD Cowen raised BlackRock from a market perform rating to an outperform rating and lifted their target price for the stock from $819.00 to $938.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 16th. UBS Group lifted their target price on BlackRock from $818.00 to $850.00 and gave the stock a neutral rating in a report on Friday, April 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on BlackRock from $742.00 to $767.00 and gave the company a neutral rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 2nd. Finally, Keefe, Bruyette & Woods reiterated an outperform rating and set a $930.00 price target (up from $918.00) on shares of BlackRock in a research report on Friday, April 5th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of Moderate Buy and an average price target of $845.42.

BlackRock Price Performance

BLK opened at $747.08 on Monday. The company has a current ratio of 3.48, a quick ratio of 3.48 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32. The company has a market capitalization of $111.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.99, a PEG ratio of 1.55 and a beta of 1.37. BlackRock has a 12-month low of $596.18 and a 12-month high of $845.00. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $805.96 and its 200-day simple moving average is $755.13.

BlackRock (NYSE:BLK) last released its earnings results on Friday, April 12th. The asset manager reported $9.81 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $9.42 by $0.39. BlackRock had a return on equity of 15.34% and a net margin of 32.26%. The firm had revenue of $4.73 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $4.65 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $7.93 earnings per share. The company’s revenue was up 11.4% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that BlackRock will post 41.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at BlackRock

In other news, General Counsel Christopher J. Meade sold 18,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $282.54, for a total value of $5,085,660.60. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 11,914 shares in the company, valued at $3,366,142.24. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, General Counsel Christopher J. Meade sold 18,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, January 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $282.54, for a total value of $5,085,660.60. Following the completion of the sale, the general counsel now directly owns 11,914 shares in the company, valued at $3,366,142.24. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, CEO Laurence Fink sold 30,978 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 28th. The shares were sold at an average price of $809.92, for a total value of $25,089,701.76. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 414,146 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $335,425,128.32. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 100,511 shares of company stock worth $71,864,028. 0.90% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of BlackRock

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in BLK. Fairfield Bush & CO. purchased a new stake in shares of BlackRock during the first quarter worth approximately $115,000. United Bank increased its position in shares of BlackRock by 17.1% during the first quarter. United Bank now owns 1,287 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $983,000 after purchasing an additional 188 shares in the last quarter. Panagora Asset Management Inc. increased its position in shares of BlackRock by 2.6% during the first quarter. Panagora Asset Management Inc. now owns 1,978 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,512,000 after purchasing an additional 51 shares in the last quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC increased its position in shares of BlackRock by 35.4% during the first quarter. Sequoia Financial Advisors LLC now owns 1,025 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $783,000 after purchasing an additional 268 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. boosted its stake in BlackRock by 11.7% during the first quarter. Brown Brothers Harriman & Co. now owns 1,452 shares of the asset manager’s stock worth $1,110,000 after buying an additional 152 shares during the last quarter. 80.69% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

BlackRock Company Profile

BlackRock, Inc is a publicly owned investment manager. The firm primarily provides its services to institutional, intermediary, and individual investors including corporate, public, union, and industry pension plans, insurance companies, third-party mutual funds, endowments, public institutions, governments, foundations, charities, sovereign wealth funds, corporations, official institutions, and banks.