EVERTEC (NYSE:EVTC) Upgraded at Morgan Stanley

Morgan Stanley upgraded shares of EVERTEC (NYSE:EVTC) from an underweight rating to an equal weight rating in a research report report published on Thursday, MarketBeat reports. They currently have $35.00 price target on the business services provider’s stock, up from their previous price target of $33.00.

Separately, Susquehanna cut EVERTEC from a “neutral” rating to a “negative” rating and reduced their target price for the company from $38.00 to $28.00 in a research note on Thursday, September 5th.

EVERTEC Stock Performance

NYSE:EVTC opened at $36.06 on Thursday. The business has a 50 day moving average of $33.64 and a 200 day moving average of $33.86. The company has a market capitalization of $2.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.21, a PEG ratio of 1.62 and a beta of 1.15. EVERTEC has a 1-year low of $28.76 and a 1-year high of $42.21. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.84, a current ratio of 1.97 and a quick ratio of 1.97.

EVERTEC (NYSE:EVTC) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, November 6th. The business services provider reported $0.86 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.73 by $0.13. The business had revenue of $211.80 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $211.51 million. EVERTEC had a return on equity of 33.01% and a net margin of 10.20%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 22.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.72 EPS. On average, sell-side analysts predict that EVERTEC will post 2.55 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

EVERTEC Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, December 6th. Shareholders of record on Monday, October 28th will be issued a $0.05 dividend. This represents a $0.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.55%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, October 28th. EVERTEC’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 15.63%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, EVP Miguel Vizcarrondo sold 40,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.11, for a total transaction of $1,364,400.00. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 129,928 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,431,844.08. This represents a 23.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Corporate insiders own 0.83% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of EVERTEC

A number of hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of EVTC. Opal Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in EVERTEC during the second quarter valued at $28,000. Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio purchased a new stake in EVERTEC in the third quarter worth about $28,000. Point72 Asia Singapore Pte. Ltd. purchased a new stake in EVERTEC in the third quarter worth about $55,000. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. increased its position in EVERTEC by 866.5% in the second quarter. Northwestern Mutual Wealth Management Co. now owns 2,426 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $81,000 after buying an additional 2,175 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Benjamin F. Edwards & Company Inc. increased its position in EVERTEC by 90.7% in the second quarter. Benjamin F. Edwards & Company Inc. now owns 3,132 shares of the business services provider’s stock worth $104,000 after buying an additional 1,490 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 96.80% of the company’s stock.

EVERTEC Company Profile

EVERTEC, Inc engages in transaction processing business and financial technology in Latin America and the Caribbean. The company operates through four segments: Payment Services – Puerto Rico & Caribbean; Latin America Payments and Solutions; Merchant Acquiring; and Business Solutions. It provides merchant acquiring services, which enable point of sales and e-commerce merchants to accept and process electronic methods of payment, such as debit, credit, prepaid, and electronic benefit transfer (EBT) cards.