Howard Capital Management Inc. Acquires 67 Shares of ANSYS, Inc. (NASDAQ:ANSS)

Howard Capital Management Inc. grew its stake in shares of ANSYS, Inc. (NASDAQ:ANSS) by 2.9% in the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,373 shares of the software maker’s stock after purchasing an additional 67 shares during the quarter. Howard Capital Management Inc.’s holdings in ANSYS were worth $800,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. State Street Corp boosted its position in ANSYS by 3.0% in the 3rd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 3,703,249 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $1,179,966,000 after buying an additional 106,187 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in shares of ANSYS by 1.7% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 2,305,554 shares of the software maker’s stock valued at $732,672,000 after purchasing an additional 37,577 shares during the period. Impax Asset Management Group plc grew its stake in ANSYS by 8.0% in the third quarter. Impax Asset Management Group plc now owns 603,394 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $192,259,000 after purchasing an additional 44,605 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. grew its stake in ANSYS by 1.3% in the fourth quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 570,525 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $192,456,000 after purchasing an additional 7,098 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. increased its holdings in ANSYS by 1.7% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 532,142 shares of the software maker’s stock worth $169,556,000 after purchasing an additional 8,706 shares during the period. 92.39% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insider Buying and Selling at ANSYS

In other news, Director Glenda Dorchak sold 200 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, January 13th. The stock was sold at an average price of $336.62, for a total transaction of $67,324.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 3,430 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,154,606.60. This represents a 5.51 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. 0.46% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

ANSS has been the subject of several research reports. Rosenblatt Securities upped their target price on ANSYS from $335.00 to $340.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of ANSYS from $350.00 to $365.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, November 7th. Finally, StockNews.com raised shares of ANSYS from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday.

ANSYS Trading Down 1.8 %

ANSS opened at $334.21 on Monday. The company has a current ratio of 3.01, a quick ratio of 3.11 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12. The firm has a market cap of $29.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 51.02, a PEG ratio of 3.55 and a beta of 1.12. ANSYS, Inc. has a 12 month low of $289.82 and a 12 month high of $363.03. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $342.69 and a 200-day moving average price of $333.19.

ANSYS (NASDAQ:ANSS) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 19th. The software maker reported $3.65 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $3.97 by ($0.32). ANSYS had a net margin of 22.62% and a return on equity of 12.69%. The firm had revenue of $882.17 million for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $864.46 million. As a group, equities research analysts anticipate that ANSYS, Inc. will post 8.32 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

ANSYS Profile

ANSYS, Inc develops and markets engineering simulation software and services for engineers, designers, researchers, and students in the United States, Japan, Germany, China, Hong Kong, South Korea, rest of Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and internationally. It offers structural analysis product suite that provides simulation tools for product design and optimization; the Ansys Mechanical product, an element analysis software; LS-DYNA solver for multiphysics simulation; and power analysis and optimization software suite.