UBS Group Raises StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) Price Target to $65.00

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) had its target price raised by UBS Group from $55.00 to $65.00 in a research report report published on Tuesday morning, Benzinga reports. UBS Group currently has a neutral rating on the stock.

Several other equities analysts have also recently weighed in on STEP. The Goldman Sachs Group raised their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $51.50 to $57.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. Evercore ISI raised their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $52.00 to $55.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Monday, October 14th. Oppenheimer raised their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $56.00 to $73.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Wednesday, October 16th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $56.00 to $61.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, October 1st. Finally, Morgan Stanley raised their price target on shares of StepStone Group from $52.00 to $60.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 10th. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and three have issued a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $54.69.

StepStone Group Stock Performance

Shares of STEP stock opened at $60.84 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $6.73 billion, a P/E ratio of 67.60 and a beta of 1.28. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $56.35 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $47.43. StepStone Group has a 52 week low of $25.06 and a 52 week high of $62.99.

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, August 8th. The company reported $0.48 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate 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. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 4.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $0.26 earnings per share. Analysts forecast that StepStone Group will post 1.85 earnings per share for the current year.

StepStone Group Increases Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 13th. Shareholders of record on Friday, August 30th were given a dividend of $0.24 per share. This represents a $0.96 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.58%. This is a boost from StepStone Group’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.21. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 30th. StepStone Group’s payout ratio is 106.67%.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On StepStone Group

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in STEP. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its position in StepStone Group by 1.8% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 5,270,144 shares of the company’s stock worth $167,749,000 after purchasing an additional 90,974 shares during the period. Wasatch Advisors LP boosted its position in StepStone Group by 1.6% during the first quarter. Wasatch Advisors LP now owns 2,948,665 shares of the company’s stock worth $105,385,000 after purchasing an additional 46,860 shares during the period. BI Asset Management Fondsmaeglerselskab A S bought a new position in StepStone Group during the first quarter worth $149,000. Oppenheimer Asset Management Inc. boosted its position in StepStone Group by 7.7% during the first quarter. Oppenheimer Asset Management Inc. now owns 36,225 shares of the company’s stock worth $1,295,000 after purchasing an additional 2,587 shares during the period. Finally, ProShare Advisors LLC boosted its position in StepStone Group by 10.8% during the first quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 9,898 shares of the company’s stock worth $354,000 after purchasing an additional 963 shares during the period. 55.54% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

StepStone Group Company Profile

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