Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. Raises Stock Holdings in IDEX Corporation $IEX

Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd. lifted its stake in IDEX Corporation (NYSE:IEX) by 6.8% during the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor owned 141,793 shares of the industrial products company’s stock after purchasing an additional 8,970 shares during the quarter. Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management Co. Ltd.’s holdings in IDEX were worth $24,895,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in IEX. Horizon Investments LLC raised its stake in IDEX by 5.2% during the 1st quarter. Horizon Investments LLC now owns 1,087 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $197,000 after acquiring an additional 54 shares during the period. Empowered Funds LLC raised its position in shares of IDEX by 3.4% during the 1st quarter. Empowered Funds LLC now owns 1,646 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $298,000 after purchasing an additional 54 shares during the period. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. lifted its stake in shares of IDEX by 2.0% during the 2nd quarter. Cullen Frost Bankers Inc. now owns 3,112 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $546,000 after buying an additional 60 shares in the last quarter. Blue Trust Inc. lifted its stake in shares of IDEX by 21.5% during the 2nd quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 446 shares of the industrial products company’s stock valued at $78,000 after buying an additional 79 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Xponance Inc. boosted its holdings in IDEX by 0.9% in the 1st quarter. Xponance Inc. now owns 10,395 shares of the industrial products company’s stock worth $1,881,000 after buying an additional 91 shares during the period. 97.96% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the company. DA Davidson set a $180.00 price objective on IDEX and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, August 4th. Oppenheimer set a $210.00 target price on IDEX in a research note on Tuesday, October 7th. Royal Bank Of Canada lowered their price target on IDEX from $200.00 to $195.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 30th. Stifel Nicolaus cut their price objective on shares of IDEX from $204.00 to $191.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Monday, October 20th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reissued a “hold (c-)” rating on shares of IDEX in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $198.86.

IDEX Stock Performance

NYSE:IEX opened at $169.43 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.47, a current ratio of 2.93 and a quick ratio of 2.13. IDEX Corporation has a 1 year low of $153.36 and a 1 year high of $237.38. The stock’s 50 day simple moving average is $164.89 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $172.35. The company has a market cap of $12.68 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.81, a PEG ratio of 1.83 and a beta of 1.04.

IDEX (NYSE:IEX) last posted its earnings results on Friday, December 16th. The industrial products company reported $1.79 EPS for the quarter. IDEX had a return on equity of 15.20% and a net margin of 13.97%.The firm had revenue of $712.00 million during the quarter. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that IDEX Corporation will post 8.26 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

IDEX Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, October 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, October 10th were paid a $0.71 dividend. This represents a $2.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.7%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, October 10th. IDEX’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 44.94%.

IDEX declared that its Board of Directors has approved a share buyback plan on Thursday, September 18th that allows the company to repurchase $1.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization allows the industrial products company to buy up to 8.3% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

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.