StepStone Group Inc. (STEP) To Go Ex-Dividend on June 14th

StepStone Group Inc. (NASDAQ:STEP – Get Rating) declared a Variable dividend on Wednesday, May 24th, Zacks reports. Investors of record on Thursday, June 15th will be paid a dividend of 0.45 per share on Friday, June 30th. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, June 14th.

StepStone Group has a dividend payout ratio of 41.7% meaning its dividend is sufficiently covered by earnings. Research analysts expect StepStone Group to earn $1.80 per share next year, which means the company should continue to be able to cover its $0.80 annual dividend with an expected future payout ratio of 44.4%.

StepStone Group Price Performance

Shares of STEP stock opened at $21.14 on Friday. The stock has a market cap of $2.31 billion, a P/E ratio of -68.19 and a beta of 1.36. StepStone Group has a one year low of $19.83 and a one year high of $32.12. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $22.74 and a 200 day moving average price of $26.35.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP – Get Rating) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, May 24th. The company reported $0.24 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.28 by ($0.04). The company had revenue of $152.94 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $145.36 million. StepStone Group’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.4% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $0.38 earnings per share. Equities research analysts anticipate that StepStone Group will post 1.39 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, CAO David Y. Park sold 2,400 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, March 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $28.52, for a total value of $68,448.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 31,864 shares in the company, valued at $908,761.28. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. 20.01% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of StepStone Group

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in STEP. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its holdings in StepStone Group by 9.2% in the second quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 5,437,768 shares of the company’s stock valued at $141,545,000 after acquiring an additional 460,189 shares during the last quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings in StepStone Group by 1.3% during the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 4,793,131 shares of the company’s stock worth $158,461,000 after buying an additional 61,820 shares during the last quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted its holdings in StepStone Group by 5.3% during the first quarter. JPMorgan Chase & Co. now owns 4,297,392 shares of the company’s stock worth $104,298,000 after buying an additional 215,867 shares during the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. boosted its holdings in StepStone Group by 8.5% during the first quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 3,728,516 shares of the company’s stock worth $90,491,000 after buying an additional 292,992 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Alliancebernstein L.P. boosted its holdings in StepStone Group by 0.9% during the fourth quarter. Alliancebernstein L.P. now owns 3,034,387 shares of the company’s stock worth $76,406,000 after buying an additional 28,059 shares during the last quarter. 93.82% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research analysts recently commented on the company. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their target price on StepStone Group from $29.00 to $33.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, February 10th. Barclays dropped their price objective on StepStone Group from $26.00 to $25.00 in a research note on Thursday. Morgan Stanley dropped their price objective on StepStone Group from $30.00 to $28.00 and set an “equal weight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, April 19th. TheStreet lowered StepStone Group from a “c-” rating to a “d+” rating in a research note on Thursday, May 4th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. dropped their price objective on StepStone Group from $37.00 to $36.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, February 13th. Four equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and one has issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $32.80.

StepStone Group Company Profile

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StepStone Group Inc 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, and buyout investments in mature and middle market companies.