MS investors were likely spooked this evening by Barrons's report: "Morgan Stanley is being sued by the estate of a deceased client for allegedly breaching its fiduciary duty because it pays an interest rate of as little as 0.01% on customers' uninvested cash in its default bank sweep program." For more coverage, read the full article here. On the back of this news, Morgan Stanley sank -1.3% to a price of $96.16. Are the markets overreacting?
Morgan Stanley, a financial holding company, provides various financial products and services to corporations, governments, financial institutions, and individuals in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. The company belongs to the Finance sector, which has an average price to earnings (P/E) ratio of 15.89 and an average price to book (P/B) ratio of 1.76. In contrast, Morgan Stanley has a trailing 12 month P/E ratio of 17.5 and a P/B ratio of 1.73.
Morgan Stanley has moved 16.6% over the last year compared to 25.9% for the S&P 500 -- a difference of -9.3%. Morgan Stanley has a 52 week high of $103.25 and a 52 week low of $69.42. At today's price of $96.16 per share, Morgan Stanley is -2.92% away from its target price of $99.05, and on average, analysts give the stock a rating of buy. 1.2% of the company's shares are linked to short positions, and 61.0% of the shares are owned by institutional investors.
