NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) Stock Price Expected to Rise, Northland Securities Analyst Says

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) had its target price lifted by Northland Securities from $108.00 to $120.00 in a research note released on Friday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a market perform rating on the data storage provider’s stock.

A number of other brokerages also recently commented on NTAP. Susquehanna restated a “positive” rating and issued a $155.00 price objective on shares of NetApp in a research report on Monday, August 26th. UBS Group lifted their price target on NetApp from $121.00 to $134.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, August 29th. Barclays increased their price objective on NetApp from $116.00 to $119.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. Stifel Nicolaus boosted their target price on shares of NetApp from $138.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 29th. Finally, Evercore ISI increased their price target on shares of NetApp from $120.00 to $130.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a report on Monday, August 12th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, eleven have issued a hold rating and six have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $134.00.

NetApp Trading Up 3.1 %

Shares of NTAP stock opened at $126.18 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $25.84 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.19, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.15 and a beta of 1.24. 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 business’s 50 day moving average is $122.04 and its two-hundred day moving average is $122.81. NetApp has a twelve month low of $77.56 and a twelve month high of $135.45.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, November 21st. The data storage provider reported $1.87 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.78 by $0.09. The firm 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%. NetApp’s quarterly revenue was up 6.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.23 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that NetApp will post 5.71 EPS for the current year.

NetApp Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, January 22nd. Investors of record on Friday, January 3rd will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. The ex-dividend date is Friday, January 3rd. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.65%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 38.24%.

Insider Activity at NetApp

In other NetApp news, CEO George Kurian sold 8,500 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $118.00, for a total transaction of $1,003,000.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now directly owns 288,282 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $34,017,276. This trade represents a 2.86 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, Director Thomas Michael Nevens sold 3,333 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $119.23, for a total transaction of $397,393.59. Following the completion of the transaction, the director now directly owns 9,277 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,106,096.71. This represents a 26.43 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders have sold 23,049 shares of company stock valued at $2,807,851. 0.47% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Trading of NetApp

Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently bought and sold shares of NTAP. Bessemer Group Inc. lifted its stake in shares of NetApp by 46.1% during the 1st quarter. Bessemer Group Inc. now owns 16,720 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $1,754,000 after purchasing an additional 5,273 shares during the period. CreativeOne Wealth LLC grew its holdings in NetApp by 45.6% in the 1st quarter. CreativeOne Wealth LLC now owns 5,164 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $543,000 after buying an additional 1,618 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in shares of NetApp by 39.4% during the 1st quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 393,975 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $41,357,000 after acquiring an additional 111,439 shares during the last quarter. SVB Wealth LLC lifted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 5.2% during the 1st quarter. SVB Wealth LLC now owns 2,892 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $304,000 after acquiring an additional 142 shares during the period. Finally, Paloma Partners Management Co acquired a new stake in shares of NetApp in the first quarter worth approximately $627,000. 92.17% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

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.