1,177 Shares in VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) Purchased by Empirical Asset Management LLC

Empirical Asset Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The institutional investor bought 1,177 shares of the information services provider’s stock, valued at approximately $244,000.

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. increased its stake in shares of VeriSign by 0.8% in the 2nd quarter. D. E. Shaw & Co. Inc. now owns 1,472,803 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $261,864,000 after acquiring an additional 11,606 shares during the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its holdings in VeriSign by 44.5% during the second quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 788,687 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $139,771,000 after purchasing an additional 242,884 shares during the period. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. increased its stake in VeriSign by 7.3% in the third quarter. Jacobs Levy Equity Management Inc. now owns 693,369 shares of the information services provider’s stock valued at $131,712,000 after purchasing an additional 47,412 shares in the last quarter. Troy Asset Management Ltd acquired a new stake in VeriSign in the second quarter worth $109,040,000. Finally, BNP Paribas Financial Markets boosted its position in shares of VeriSign by 26.3% during the third quarter. BNP Paribas Financial Markets now owns 580,613 shares of the information services provider’s stock worth $110,293,000 after purchasing an additional 120,958 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.90% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other VeriSign news, EVP Danny R. Mcpherson sold 2,092 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 2nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $192.43, for a total value of $402,563.56. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 26,157 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $5,033,391.51. This represents a 7.41 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Company insiders own 0.84% of the company’s stock.

VeriSign Price Performance

Shares of VRSN opened at $209.72 on Monday. The firm has a 50-day moving average of $196.39 and a 200-day moving average of $186.89. The company has a market cap of $20.15 billion, a PE ratio of 24.39 and a beta of 0.89. VeriSign, Inc. has a one year low of $167.04 and a one year high of $213.68.

VeriSign (NASDAQ:VRSN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, October 24th. The information services provider reported $2.07 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.01 by $0.06. VeriSign had a negative return on equity of 45.59% and a net margin of 55.74%. The firm had revenue of $390.60 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $390.19 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $1.83 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 3.8% compared to the same quarter last year.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several brokerages recently commented on VRSN. StockNews.com raised VeriSign from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 7th. Citigroup boosted their price objective on VeriSign from $210.00 to $238.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. Baird R W raised VeriSign from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, December 9th. Finally, Robert W. Baird raised shares of VeriSign from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and raised their target price for the company from $200.00 to $250.00 in a research report on Monday, December 9th.

VeriSign Profile

VeriSign, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, provides domain name registry services and internet infrastructure that enables internet navigation for various recognized domain names worldwide. The company enables the security, stability, and resiliency of internet infrastructure and services, including providing root zone maintainer services, operating two of thirteen internet root servers; and offering registration services and authoritative resolution for the .com and .net domains, which supports global e-commerce.