Board of the Pension Protection Fund Buys New Position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Board of the Pension Protection Fund purchased a new position in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund purchased 7,400 shares of the data storage provider’s stock, valued at approximately $859,000.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Hollencrest Capital Management acquired a new position in shares of NetApp in the 2nd quarter worth approximately $26,000. Northwest Investment Counselors LLC acquired a new position in NetApp in the third quarter worth approximately $27,000. Hershey Financial Advisers LLC bought a new position in shares of NetApp in the second quarter valued at $45,000. True Wealth Design LLC lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 2,833.3% during the 3rd quarter. True Wealth Design LLC now owns 352 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $43,000 after acquiring an additional 340 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Capital Performance Advisors LLP bought a new stake in shares of NetApp during the 3rd quarter worth $44,000. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

NTAP has been the subject of several analyst reports. Bank of America upped 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. TD Cowen raised their target price on shares of NetApp from $145.00 to $160.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, November 22nd. Citigroup lifted their target price on shares of NetApp from $130.00 to $135.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, November 22nd. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upgraded shares of NetApp from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and set a $160.00 price target for the company in a research report on Monday, December 16th. Finally, Oppenheimer initiated coverage on shares of NetApp in a research report on Wednesday, November 13th. They set a “market perform” rating on the stock. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have assigned a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $139.20.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $116.69 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.84, a current ratio of 0.91 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $121.02 and a 200 day moving average price of $122.97. The company has a market cap of $23.72 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.45, a PEG ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 1.23. NetApp, Inc. has a twelve month low of $83.80 and a twelve month high of $135.45.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $1.78 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $1.66 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.65 billion. NetApp had a net margin of 17.78% and a return on equity of 123.63%. NetApp’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $1.23 earnings per share. Research analysts predict that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.83 earnings per share for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Stockholders of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.78%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other NetApp news, CAO Lorenzo Daniel De sold 326 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $117.44, for a total value of $38,285.44. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 451 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, January 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $116.79, for a total transaction of $52,672.29. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 12,005 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,402,063.95. The trade was a 3.62 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 51,610 shares of company stock worth $6,149,531. Company insiders own 0.47% of the company’s stock.

NetApp 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.