NetApp’s (NTAP) “Neutral” Rating Reiterated at Wedbush

Wedbush reaffirmed their neutral rating on shares of NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) in a research note issued to investors on Friday,RTT News reports. Wedbush currently has a $120.00 price target on the data storage provider’s stock.

NTAP has been the subject of a number of other research reports. Evercore ISI lifted their target price on NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock an “in-line” rating in a report on Monday, August 12th. Barclays lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Friday. Stifel Nicolaus increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Friday. UBS Group raised their target price on shares of NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Citigroup increased their price target on NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, NetApp currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $134.00.

NetApp Trading Down 3.4 %

Shares of NetApp stock opened at $122.34 on Friday. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $121.87 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $122.49. The firm has a market capitalization of $25.05 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 22.49, a PEG ratio of 3.26 and a beta of 1.24. NetApp has a 12-month low of $77.56 and a 12-month high of $135.45. The company has a current ratio of 0.96, a quick ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.34.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its earnings results on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The firm had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 119.68% and a net margin of 17.78%. The firm’s revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $1.23 EPS. Analysts predict that NetApp will post 5.71 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.70%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 38.24%.

Insider Transactions at NetApp

In related news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 705 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Thursday, October 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $126.20, for a total value of $88,971.00. Following the sale, the executive vice president now directly owns 11,694 shares in the company, valued at approximately $1,475,782.80. The trade was a 5.69 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 23,049 shares of company stock valued at $2,807,851 in the last three months. 0.47% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Trading of NetApp

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Bessemer Group Inc. boosted its stake in NetApp by 46.1% during the 1st quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 16,720 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,754,000 after purchasing an additional 5,273 shares during the last quarter. CreativeOne Wealth LLC lifted its stake in NetApp by 45.6% in the 1st quarter. CreativeOne Wealth LLC now owns 5,164 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $543,000 after purchasing an additional 1,618 shares in the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD lifted its stake in NetApp by 39.4% in the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 393,975 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $41,357,000 after purchasing an additional 111,439 shares in the last quarter. SVB Wealth LLC grew its position in shares of NetApp by 5.2% in the first quarter. SVB Wealth LLC now owns 2,892 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $304,000 after purchasing an additional 142 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Paloma Partners Management Co acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the first quarter valued at approximately $627,000. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About NetApp

NetApp, Inc provides cloud-led and data-centric services to manage and share data on-premises, and private and public clouds worldwide. It operates in two segments, Hybrid Cloud and Public Could. The company offers intelligent data management software, such as NetApp ONTAP, NetApp Snapshot, NetApp SnapCenter Backup Management, NetApp SnapMirror Data Replication, NetApp SnapLock Data Compliance, and storage infrastructure solutions, including NetApp All-Flash FAS series, NetApp Fabric Attached Storage, NetApp E/EF series, and NetApp StorageGRID.