NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Cut to Hold at StockNews.com

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

Several other equities analysts have also commented on the company. Morgan Stanley increased their target price on NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Oppenheimer began coverage on shares of NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They issued a “market perform” rating for the company. Bank of America boosted their target price on NetApp from $115.00 to $121.00 and gave the company an “underperform” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Wedbush reaffirmed a “neutral” rating and set a $120.00 price target on shares of NetApp in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company raised their target price 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. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $126.05 on Monday. NetApp has a one year low of $83.80 and a one year high of $135.45. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a current ratio of 0.91. The firm’s 50 day moving average price is $120.94 and its 200-day moving average price is $122.67. The firm has a market cap of $25.63 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.17, a P/E/G ratio of 2.90 and a beta of 1.23.

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

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Shareholders 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 1.65%. The ex-dividend date was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Transactions at NetApp

In related news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred 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 completion of the sale, the president now owns 27,099 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,116,114.01. The trade was a 44.81 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 43,110 shares of company stock valued at $5,077,596 in the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of the stock. KBC Group NV grew its stake in shares of NetApp by 276.9% during the fourth quarter. KBC Group NV now owns 891,033 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $103,431,000 after acquiring an additional 654,626 shares in the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of NetApp by 59.6% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 1,643,146 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $211,637,000 after buying an additional 613,583 shares during the last quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of NetApp by 8.2% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 5,985,673 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $738,280,000 after buying an additional 453,324 shares during the last quarter. APG Asset Management US Inc. acquired a new stake in NetApp in the second quarter valued at $48,074,000. Finally, Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. grew its holdings in NetApp by 38.5% during the 3rd quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 1,232,852 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $152,270,000 after acquiring an additional 342,415 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds 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.