Advisory Alpha LLC Purchases Shares of 2,046 NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Advisory Alpha LLC purchased a new stake in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 2,046 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $238,000.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Atomi Financial Group Inc. increased its stake in NetApp by 6.6% in the fourth quarter. Atomi Financial Group Inc. now owns 2,415 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $280,000 after purchasing an additional 150 shares in the last quarter. UMB Bank n.a. increased its position in shares of NetApp by 28.8% during the fourth quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 900 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $104,000 after acquiring an additional 201 shares in the last quarter. Diversify Advisory Services LLC increased its position in shares of NetApp by 77.8% during the fourth quarter. Diversify Advisory Services LLC now owns 4,323 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $503,000 after acquiring an additional 1,891 shares in the last quarter. Artemis Investment Management LLP increased its position in shares of NetApp by 15.6% during the fourth quarter. Artemis Investment Management LLP now owns 83,472 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $9,689,000 after acquiring an additional 11,278 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Kera Capital Partners Inc. bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the fourth quarter worth about $213,000. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms have recently commented on NTAP. 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 research report on Friday, November 22nd. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $140.00 to $145.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. Oppenheimer began coverage on shares of NetApp in a report on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating on the stock. Citigroup boosted their price target on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Finally, StockNews.com cut shares of NetApp from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a report on Monday. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $126.30 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $25.68 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.22, a PEG ratio of 2.93 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. The firm’s 50 day moving average is $121.07 and its 200 day moving average is $122.69. NetApp, Inc. has a 12 month low of $83.80 and a 12 month high of $135.45.

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

NetApp Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd were issued 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 of this dividend was Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 38.24%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 21st. The shares were sold at an average price of $123.03, for a total value of $1,045,755.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 271,282 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $33,375,824.46. This represents a 3.04 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total transaction of $2,529,780.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the president now directly owns 27,099 shares in the company, 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. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 51,610 shares of company stock valued at $6,123,351. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

NetApp Company Profile

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.