Teacher Retirement System of Texas Acquires 147,962 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP)

Teacher Retirement System of Texas grew its holdings in NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) by 29.0% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 658,213 shares of the data storage provider’s stock after buying an additional 147,962 shares during the quarter. Teacher Retirement System of Texas owned 0.32% of NetApp worth $76,405,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Resonant Capital Advisors LLC raised its position in NetApp by 1.8% in the fourth quarter. Resonant Capital Advisors LLC now owns 4,442 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $516,000 after purchasing an additional 80 shares in the last quarter. Larson Financial Group LLC raised its holdings in shares of NetApp by 2.5% in the 4th quarter. Larson Financial Group LLC now owns 3,778 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $438,000 after buying an additional 92 shares in the last quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. raised its holdings in shares of NetApp by 22.3% in the 4th quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 549 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $64,000 after buying an additional 100 shares in the last quarter. Moors & Cabot Inc. lifted its position in shares of NetApp by 3.6% during the 4th quarter. Moors & Cabot Inc. now owns 2,906 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $337,000 after buying an additional 100 shares during the period. Finally, Steward Partners Investment Advisory LLC boosted its stake in NetApp by 2.5% in the 4th quarter. Steward Partners Investment Advisory LLC now owns 4,597 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $534,000 after buying an additional 111 shares in the last quarter. 92.17% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

NTAP has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Susquehanna cut NetApp from a “positive” rating to a “neutral” rating and cut their price objective for the company from $155.00 to $130.00 in a report on Monday, February 10th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. cut their price target on shares of NetApp from $160.00 to $153.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Friday, February 28th. Loop Capital decreased their price objective 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. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of NetApp from $132.00 to $146.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, December 17th. Finally, Barclays reduced their target price on NetApp from $132.00 to $115.00 and set an “equal weight” rating on the stock in a report on Friday, February 28th. Twelve equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, NetApp presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $129.07.

NetApp Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ:NTAP opened at $93.53 on Thursday. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.84 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.39. NetApp, Inc. has a 1-year low of $89.88 and a 1-year high of $135.45. The stock has a market capitalization of $19.03 billion, a P/E ratio of 17.19, a P/E/G ratio of 2.45 and a beta of 1.24. The business has a 50-day moving average price of $113.44 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $118.46.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 23rd. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 4th will be given a dividend of $0.52 per share. This represents a $2.08 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.22%. The ex-dividend date is Friday, April 4th. NetApp’s payout ratio is 38.52%.

Insider Activity

In other news, EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 528 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction on Monday, March 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $92.58, for a total transaction of $48,882.24. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 12,900 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,194,282. This trade represents a 3.93 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, President Cesar Cernuda sold 22,000 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, December 30th. The stock was sold at an average price of $114.99, for a total value of $2,529,780.00. Following the sale, the president now directly owns 27,099 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,116,114.01. This represents a 44.81 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 52,931 shares of company stock valued at $6,252,759 in the last 90 days. 0.47% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.