NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) Receives $117.79 Consensus Target Price from Brokerages

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) has been assigned an average recommendation of “Hold” from the sixteen analysts that are covering the company, MarketBeat.com reports. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell recommendation, nine have given a hold recommendation and six have issued a buy recommendation on the company. The average 1 year target price among brokers that have covered the stock in the last year is $117.79.

Several brokerages have commented on NTAP. UBS Group dropped their price target on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $108.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Friday, May 30th. Loop Capital dropped their price target on shares of NetApp from $150.00 to $130.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, March 4th. Barclays raised their price target on shares of NetApp from $115.00 to $117.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Friday, May 30th. Evercore ISI dropped their price target on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $100.00 and set an “in-line” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, April 28th. Finally, Citigroup raised their price target on shares of NetApp from $105.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, June 2nd.

NetApp Price Performance

NTAP opened at $106.69 on Friday. The firm has a market cap of $21.38 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 18.78, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.46 and a beta of 1.42. NetApp has a fifty-two week low of $71.84 and a fifty-two week high of $135.45. The company’s 50-day moving average price is $99.06 and its 200 day moving average price is $103.94. The company has a quick ratio of 1.22, a current ratio of 1.25 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.39.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last released its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 29th. The data storage provider reported $1.93 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.90 by $0.03. The firm had revenue of $1.73 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.72 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 18.05% and a return on equity of 126.96%. NetApp’s quarterly revenue was up 3.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $1.80 earnings per share. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that NetApp will post 5.89 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, July 23rd. Investors of record on Thursday, July 3rd will be paid a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, July 3rd. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.95%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is presently 36.62%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, April 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $81.83, for a total transaction of $695,555.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 249,765 shares in the company, valued at $20,438,269.95. This trade represents a 3.29% 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. Also, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 302 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, June 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $98.77, for a total transaction of $29,828.54. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 455 shares in the company, valued at $44,940.35. This represents a 39.89% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 17,302 shares of company stock worth $1,590,514 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of NetApp

Large investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. M&T Bank Corp boosted its holdings in NetApp by 4.8% during the fourth quarter. M&T Bank Corp now owns 12,794 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,485,000 after buying an additional 581 shares in the last quarter. Versor Investments LP bought a new stake in NetApp during the fourth quarter worth approximately $395,000. AMJ Financial Wealth Management boosted its holdings in NetApp by 120.7% during the fourth quarter. AMJ Financial Wealth Management now owns 68,897 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $7,998,000 after buying an additional 37,684 shares in the last quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. boosted its holdings in NetApp by 39.6% during the first quarter. Assenagon Asset Management S.A. now owns 36,998 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $3,250,000 after buying an additional 10,494 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Brandywine Global Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in NetApp during the fourth quarter worth approximately $5,151,000. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.