Insider Buying: Prospect Capital Co. (NASDAQ:PSEC) CEO Purchases 205,900 Shares of Stock

Prospect Capital Co. (NASDAQ:PSEC) CEO John F. Barry acquired 205,900 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The stock was purchased at an average price of $4.40 per share, for a total transaction of $905,960.00. Following the acquisition, the chief executive officer now directly owns 72,612,839 shares in the company, valued at $319,496,491.60. This represents a 0.28 % increase in their position. The acquisition was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website.

Prospect Capital Stock Up 2.9 %

Shares of PSEC opened at $4.64 on Wednesday. Prospect Capital Co. has a 52-week low of $4.15 and a 52-week high of $6.30. The company has a quick ratio of 0.48, a current ratio of 0.48 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.65. The stock has a fifty day simple moving average of $5.15 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $5.31. The company has a market capitalization of $2.02 billion, a PE ratio of -17.85 and a beta of 1.00.

Prospect Capital (NASDAQ:PSEC) last issued its earnings results on Friday, November 8th. The financial services provider reported $0.21 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.17 by $0.04. Prospect Capital had a negative net margin of 2.23% and a positive return on equity of 12.19%. The company had revenue of $196.31 million for the quarter.

Prospect Capital Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a monthly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, February 19th. Investors of record on Wednesday, January 29th will be given a $0.045 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, January 29th. This represents a $0.54 annualized dividend and a yield of 11.64%. Prospect Capital’s payout ratio is -276.92%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Prospect Capital

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently added to or reduced their stakes in PSEC. Arete Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Prospect Capital during the 3rd quarter worth about $1,199,000. XTX Topco Ltd acquired a new stake in shares of Prospect Capital during the third quarter valued at about $88,000. Paloma Partners Management Co purchased a new stake in shares of Prospect Capital in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $578,000. Captrust Financial Advisors lifted its holdings in shares of Prospect Capital by 34.9% in the 3rd quarter. Captrust Financial Advisors now owns 14,247 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $76,000 after acquiring an additional 3,686 shares during the last quarter. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets boosted its position in shares of Prospect Capital by 99.4% during the 3rd quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 136,249 shares of the financial services provider’s stock worth $729,000 after purchasing an additional 67,920 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 9.06% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of research firms recently weighed in on PSEC. Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price target on shares of Prospect Capital from $5.00 to $4.50 and set an “underweight” rating on the stock in a research report on Friday, August 30th. StockNews.com cut Prospect Capital from a “hold” rating to a “sell” rating in a report on Friday, August 30th.

About Prospect Capital

Prospect Capital Corporation is a business development company. It specializes in middle market, mature, mezzanine finance, later stage, emerging growth, leveraged buyouts, refinancing, acquisitions, recapitalizations, turnaround, growth capital, development, capital expenditures and subordinated debt tranches of collateralized loan obligations, cash flow term loans, market place lending and bridge transactions.