Nordea Investment Management AB Buys 43,786 Shares of IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX)

Nordea Investment Management AB increased its stake in shares of IDEX Co. (NYSE:IEX) by 5.3% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 862,625 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after acquiring an additional 43,786 shares during the period. Nordea Investment Management AB’s holdings in IDEX were worth $181,272,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the company. Catalyst Capital Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of IDEX by 73.8% during the third quarter. Catalyst Capital Advisors LLC now owns 139 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $30,000 after acquiring an additional 59 shares during the period. Assetmark Inc. bought a new position in IDEX during the 3rd quarter valued at about $39,000. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt boosted its position in IDEX by 100.0% in the third quarter. Livforsakringsbolaget Skandia Omsesidigt now owns 200 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $43,000 after buying an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC grew its stake in IDEX by 19.9% during the second quarter. EverSource Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 344 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $72,000 after buying an additional 57 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Brooklyn Investment Group bought a new position in shares of IDEX in the third quarter valued at approximately $86,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 97.96% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts recently weighed in on IEX shares. Citigroup raised their price target on IDEX from $251.00 to $269.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, December 9th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on IDEX from $244.00 to $256.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Wednesday, December 11th. Robert W. Baird decreased their price objective on shares of IDEX from $245.00 to $241.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada boosted their target price on shares of IDEX from $248.00 to $258.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, December 6th. Three research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $243.14.

IDEX Trading Up 1.1 %

IEX opened at $209.21 on Tuesday. IDEX Co. has a fifty-two week low of $189.51 and a fifty-two week high of $246.36. The company has a market cap of $15.84 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.39, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.36 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.54, a current ratio of 2.97 and a quick ratio of 2.11. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $222.01 and a 200 day simple moving average of $209.77.

IDEX (NYSE:IEX) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, October 29th. The industrial products company reported $1.90 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.89 by $0.01. IDEX had a return on equity of 15.92% and a net margin of 15.35%. The company had revenue of $798.20 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $793.05 million. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $2.12 EPS. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up .6% on a year-over-year basis. On average, sell-side analysts anticipate that IDEX Co. will post 7.89 earnings per share for the current year.

IDEX Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, January 31st. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 17th will be paid a $0.69 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, January 17th. This represents a $2.76 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.32%. IDEX’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 42.72%.

IDEX Company Profile

IDEX Corporation, together with its subsidiaries, provides applied solutions worldwide. The company operates through three segments: Fluid & Metering Technologies (FMT), Health & Science Technologies (HST), and Fire & Safety/Diversified Products (FSDP). The FMT segment designs, produces, and distributes positive displacement pumps, valves, small volume provers, flow meters, injectors, and other fluid-handling pump modules and systems, as well as flow monitoring and other services for the food, chemical, general industrial, water and wastewater, agricultural, and energy industries.