Tobam Boosts Stock Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Tobam increased its position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 61.1% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 1,284 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after acquiring an additional 487 shares during the quarter. Tobam’s holdings in NetApp were worth $149,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd raised its holdings in NetApp by 3.3% during the fourth quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui DS Asset Management Company Ltd now owns 39,746 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $4,614,000 after acquiring an additional 1,268 shares during the period. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. bought a new stake in NetApp during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $26,000. Measured Wealth Private Client Group LLC lifted its holdings in NetApp by 59.9% in the 4th quarter. Measured Wealth Private Client Group LLC now owns 5,752 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $668,000 after purchasing an additional 2,155 shares in the last quarter. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. boosted its stake in NetApp by 1.1% in the 4th quarter. GHP Investment Advisors Inc. now owns 120,470 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $13,984,000 after purchasing an additional 1,282 shares during the period. Finally, Meritage Portfolio Management grew its holdings in NetApp by 129.1% during the 4th quarter. Meritage Portfolio Management now owns 69,381 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $8,054,000 after buying an additional 39,097 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CFO Michael J. Berry sold 12,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, February 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $120.74, for a total value of $1,509,250.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 123,243 shares in the company, valued at approximately $14,880,359.82. This represents a 9.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the sale, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,116,114.01. The trade was a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 64,110 shares of company stock worth $7,632,601 over the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several equities analysts have recently commented on the stock. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Northland Securities increased their price objective on shares of NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. TD Cowen raised their price objective on NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. StockNews.com raised NetApp from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 28th. Finally, Oppenheimer began coverage on NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating for the company. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, nine have assigned a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

NetApp Trading Down 0.9 %

Shares of NTAP opened at $122.91 on Friday. The company’s fifty day simple moving average is $120.98 and its 200-day simple moving average is $122.15. The company has a market cap of $24.99 billion, a P/E ratio of 22.59, a P/E/G ratio of 2.90 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39. NetApp, Inc. has a twelve month low of $83.80 and a twelve month high of $135.45.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The company had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.65 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the company posted $1.23 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, analysts expect that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.89 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a $0.52 dividend. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.69%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 38.24%.

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.