NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Downgraded by StockNews.com to Hold

StockNews.com downgraded shares of NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) from a buy rating to a hold rating in a report released on Tuesday morning.

Other equities research analysts also recently issued reports about the company. Stifel Nicolaus increased their price target on NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Barclays upped their target price on NetApp from $119.00 to $132.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the stock an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of NetApp from $135.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Northland Securities lifted their price objective on shares of NetApp from $108.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, NetApp currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus price target of $137.53.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NetApp stock opened at $119.56 on Tuesday. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $120.98 and a 200 day simple moving average of $122.02. The firm has a market cap of $24.31 billion, a P/E ratio of 21.98, a P/E/G ratio of 2.94 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp has a fifty-two week low of $83.80 and a fifty-two week high of $135.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a current ratio of 0.91 and a quick ratio of 0.84.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. The business 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 business posted $1.23 earnings per share. NetApp’s revenue was up 6.1% compared to the same quarter last year. Sell-side analysts predict that NetApp will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.74%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is 38.24%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CFO Michael J. Berry sold 12,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, February 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $120.74, for a total transaction of $1,509,250.00. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 123,243 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $14,880,359.82. This represents a 9.21 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on 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. This trade represents a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last three months, insiders have sold 64,110 shares of company stock valued at $7,632,601. 0.47% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of the stock. Migdal Insurance & Financial Holdings Ltd. purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the 4th quarter worth approximately $26,000. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC purchased a new stake in NetApp during the 3rd quarter worth about $27,000. Assetmark Inc. boosted its position in shares of NetApp by 826.9% in the fourth quarter. Assetmark Inc. now owns 241 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $28,000 after acquiring an additional 215 shares during the period. Synergy Investment Management LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the fourth quarter worth $32,000. Finally, Golden State Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in shares of NetApp in the 4th quarter valued at about $35,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 92.17% of the company’s stock.

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.