Truist Financial Corp Cuts Stock Holdings in StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP)

Truist Financial Corp cut its stake in StepStone Group LP (NASDAQ:STEP) by 14.7% in the second quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 38,320 shares of the company’s stock after selling 6,619 shares during the period. Truist Financial Corp’s holdings in StepStone Group were worth $1,759,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of STEP. Wellington Management Group LLP raised its holdings in shares of StepStone Group by 9.8% in the 4th quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 6,994,497 shares of the company’s stock valued at $222,635,000 after purchasing an additional 627,059 shares in the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in StepStone Group by 1.8% during the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 5,270,144 shares of the company’s stock worth $167,749,000 after buying an additional 90,974 shares during the last quarter. Wasatch Advisors LP boosted its position in shares of StepStone Group by 1.6% during the 1st quarter. Wasatch Advisors LP now owns 2,948,665 shares of the company’s stock worth $105,385,000 after acquiring an additional 46,860 shares in the last quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp increased its holdings in shares of StepStone Group by 25.3% in the 2nd quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 1,115,384 shares of the company’s stock valued at $51,185,000 after acquiring an additional 225,201 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD raised its position in shares of StepStone Group by 150.0% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 850,463 shares of the company’s stock worth $30,396,000 after acquiring an additional 510,283 shares in the last quarter. 55.54% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages have commented on STEP. The Goldman Sachs Group increased their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $51.50 to $57.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Evercore ISI boosted their price objective on StepStone Group from $41.00 to $48.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, July 15th. Barclays increased their target price on shares of StepStone Group from $51.00 to $61.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Monday, October 7th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on StepStone Group from $52.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Thursday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on StepStone Group from $56.00 to $61.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 1st. Five research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $49.44.

StepStone Group Stock Up 0.6 %

StepStone Group stock opened at $59.97 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $6.64 billion, a PE ratio of 78.91 and a beta of 1.28. StepStone Group LP has a 52 week low of $25.06 and a 52 week high of $61.39. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $54.19 and its 200 day simple moving average is $45.84.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, August 8th. The company reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.35 by $0.13. The company had revenue of $186.40 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $181.15 million. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $0.26 EPS. StepStone Group’s quarterly revenue was up 4.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts expect that StepStone Group LP will post 1.83 EPS for the current fiscal year.

StepStone Group Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 13th. Shareholders of record on Friday, August 30th were paid a $0.24 dividend. This is a boost from StepStone Group’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. This represents a $0.96 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.60%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 30th. StepStone Group’s payout ratio is presently 126.32%.

StepStone Group Profile

StepStone Group LP. is an investment firm specializing in direct, fund of funds, secondary direct, and secondary indirect investments. For direct investment, it seeks to invest in venture debt, incubation, mezzanine, distressed/vulture, seed/startup, early venture, mid venture, late venture, emerging growth, later stage, turnaround, growth capital, industry consolidation, recapitalization, private equity and buyout investments in mature and middle market companies.