Louisiana State Employees Retirement System Takes Position in Pegasystems Inc. $PEGA

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System purchased a new position in shares of Pegasystems Inc. (NASDAQ:PEGA) in the 1st quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor purchased 26,500 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,128,000.

Several other large investors also recently added to or reduced their stakes in PEGA. AQR Capital Management LLC raised its stake in Pegasystems by 236.2% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 4,037,552 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $217,584,000 after acquiring an additional 2,836,733 shares during the period. State Street Corp boosted its position in Pegasystems by 255.3% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,907,677 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $157,393,000 after purchasing an additional 2,089,375 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP increased its stake in shares of Pegasystems by 271.7% in the third quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,111,736 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $63,925,000 after purchasing an additional 812,634 shares in the last quarter. Capital Impact Advisors LLC purchased a new position in shares of Pegasystems in the fourth quarter worth about $45,705,000. Finally, Shannon River Fund Management LLC raised its position in shares of Pegasystems by 105.8% in the third quarter. Shannon River Fund Management LLC now owns 1,384,219 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $79,593,000 after purchasing an additional 711,654 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 46.89% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CAO Efstathios A. Kouninis sold 750 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Friday, May 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $34.75, for a total transaction of $26,062.50. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer directly owned 2,894 shares in the company, valued at $100,566.50. The trade was a 20.58% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, insider Rifat Kerim Akgonul sold 4,545 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, May 19th. The stock was sold at an average price of $33.35, for a total transaction of $151,575.75. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider directly owned 107,070 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,570,784.50. The trade was a 4.07% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 6,795 shares of company stock valued at $229,613 over the last 90 days. Company insiders own 48.40% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of brokerages recently commented on PEGA. Royal Bank Of Canada restated an “outperform” rating on shares of Pegasystems in a research note on Tuesday, June 9th. Citigroup reissued a “market outperform” rating on shares of Pegasystems in a report on Wednesday, June 10th. Zacks Research cut shares of Pegasystems from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Friday, April 24th. Citizens Jmp restated a “market outperform” rating and set a $58.00 target price on shares of Pegasystems in a research report on Wednesday, June 10th. Finally, Wedbush reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $60.00 price target on shares of Pegasystems in a report on Thursday, April 23rd. Eight research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have given a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $63.30.

Pegasystems Stock Performance

Shares of Pegasystems stock opened at $31.05 on Friday. Pegasystems Inc. has a 12-month low of $28.66 and a 12-month high of $68.10. The company has a market cap of $5.19 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 16.69 and a beta of 0.87. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $33.59 and its 200-day moving average price is $42.82.

Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, April 21st. The technology company reported $0.46 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.68 by ($0.22). The firm had revenue of $429.97 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $473.24 million. Pegasystems had a net margin of 20.04% and a return on equity of 30.05%. Pegasystems’s revenue was down 9.6% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $0.76 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts predict that Pegasystems Inc. will post 1.93 earnings per share for the current year.

Pegasystems Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 15th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, July 1st will be issued a $0.03 dividend. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, July 1st. Pegasystems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 6.45%.

Pegasystems Company Profile

Pegasystems Inc is a software company specializing in customer engagement and digital process automation solutions. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Pegasystems develops enterprise applications designed to help organizations streamline operations, manage customer interactions and automate complex workflows. Its platform supports a wide range of use cases, from sales and marketing optimization to case management and robotic process automation.

The core of Pegasystems’ offering is the Pega Platform, a low-code development environment that enables businesses to build and deploy applications with minimal hand-coding.