StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP) Posts Quarterly Earnings Results, Misses Expectations By $0.04 EPS

StepStone Group (NASDAQ:STEP – Get Rating) posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday. The company reported $0.24 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.28 by ($0.04), Briefing.com reports. The firm had revenue of $152.94 million for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $145.36 million. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $0.38 EPS. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.4% on a year-over-year basis.

StepStone Group Price Performance

NASDAQ:STEP opened at $21.14 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $2.31 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of -68.19 and a beta of 1.36. The company has a 50 day moving average price of $22.74 and a 200-day moving average price of $26.35. StepStone Group has a 1-year low of $19.83 and a 1-year high of $32.12.

StepStone Group Dividend Announcement

The company also recently announced a Variable dividend, which will be paid on Friday, June 30th. Stockholders of record on Thursday, June 15th will be issued a dividend of $0.45 per share. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, June 14th. StepStone Group’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is -258.06%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CAO David Y. Park sold 2,400 shares of StepStone Group stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $28.52, for a total transaction of $68,448.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief accounting officer now directly owns 31,864 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $908,761.28. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Insiders own 20.01% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On StepStone Group

A number of large investors have recently bought and sold shares of STEP. Bank of New York Mellon Corp raised its holdings in StepStone Group by 9.3% in the 1st quarter. Bank of New York Mellon Corp now owns 204,536 shares of the company’s stock worth $6,762,000 after purchasing an additional 17,367 shares during the period. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. lifted its holdings in StepStone Group by 21.5% during the first quarter. PNC Financial Services Group Inc. now owns 7,535 shares of the company’s stock valued at $250,000 after purchasing an additional 1,332 shares in the last quarter. Natixis Advisors L.P. purchased a new position in StepStone Group during the first quarter valued at $615,000. MetLife Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in StepStone Group by 70.9% during the first quarter. MetLife Investment Management LLC now owns 24,734 shares of the company’s stock valued at $818,000 after purchasing an additional 10,257 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Panagora Asset Management Inc. purchased a new position in StepStone Group during the first quarter valued at $838,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 93.82% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

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

About StepStone Group

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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.