First Trust Advisors LP Buys 812,634 Shares of Pegasystems Inc. $PEGA

First Trust Advisors LP lifted its stake in shares of Pegasystems Inc. (NASDAQ:PEGA) by 271.7% during the third quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The firm owned 1,111,736 shares of the technology company’s stock after purchasing an additional 812,634 shares during the quarter. First Trust Advisors LP’s holdings in Pegasystems were worth $63,925,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Hazlett Burt & Watson Inc. bought a new position in Pegasystems in the 3rd quarter worth about $28,000. Hantz Financial Services Inc. increased its position in shares of Pegasystems by 321.6% during the third quarter. Hantz Financial Services Inc. now owns 565 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $32,000 after buying an additional 431 shares during the period. Mather Group LLC. bought a new stake in shares of Pegasystems during the third quarter valued at about $33,000. MAI Capital Management lifted its holdings in shares of Pegasystems by 124.5% in the second quarter. MAI Capital Management now owns 696 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $38,000 after buying an additional 386 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Blue Trust Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Pegasystems by 902.9% in the third quarter. Blue Trust Inc. now owns 682 shares of the technology company’s stock worth $39,000 after buying an additional 614 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 46.89% of the company’s stock.

Insider Transactions at Pegasystems

In related news, Chairman Alan Trefler sold 45,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $49.02, for a total value of $2,205,900.00. Following the transaction, the chairman owned 44,394,454 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,176,216,135.08. This represents a 0.10% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Company insiders own 50.10% of the company’s stock.

Pegasystems Price Performance

Shares of PEGA opened at $44.69 on Wednesday. Pegasystems Inc. has a 1-year low of $29.84 and a 1-year high of $68.10. The company has a market capitalization of $7.55 billion, a P/E ratio of 20.93 and a beta of 1.06. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $48.20 and its 200 day simple moving average is $54.57.

Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 10th. The technology company reported $0.76 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.74 by $0.02. The business had revenue of $504.32 million during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $494.60 million. Pegasystems had a net margin of 22.54% and a return on equity of 38.86%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company earned $0.80 EPS. Pegasystems has set its FY 2026 guidance at 2.750-2.750 EPS. On average, equities analysts anticipate that Pegasystems Inc. will post 1.89 earnings per share for the current year.

Pegasystems Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, January 16th. Investors of record on Friday, January 2nd were given a $0.03 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 2nd. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. Pegasystems’s payout ratio is 5.63%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several equities analysts recently commented on PEGA shares. Rosenblatt Securities reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $62.00 price objective on shares of Pegasystems in a research note on Thursday, February 12th. Citigroup reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $73.00 target price (down from $81.00) on shares of Pegasystems in a research note on Thursday, February 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their price target on shares of Pegasystems from $65.00 to $74.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Friday, December 5th. Citizens Jmp reduced their price target on shares of Pegasystems from $78.00 to $58.00 and set a “market outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, February 12th. Finally, Zacks Research upgraded Pegasystems from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 13th. One research analyst has rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, nine have assigned a Buy rating and two have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $67.40.

Pegasystems Profile

Pegasystems Inc is a software company specializing in customer engagement and digital process automation solutions. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Pegasystems develops enterprise applications designed to help organizations streamline operations, manage customer interactions and automate complex workflows. Its platform supports a wide range of use cases, from sales and marketing optimization to case management and robotic process automation.

The core of Pegasystems’ offering is the Pega Platform, a low-code development environment that enables businesses to build and deploy applications with minimal hand-coding.