Elizabeth M. O’callahan Sells 871 Shares of NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) Stock

NetApp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTAP) EVP Elizabeth M. O’callahan sold 871 shares of NetApp stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, April 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $103.02, for a total value of $89,730.42. Following the transaction, the executive vice president now directly owns 9,601 shares in the company, valued at approximately $989,095.02. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink.

NetApp Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ NTAP opened at $101.81 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $21.01 billion, a P/E ratio of 23.14, a P/E/G ratio of 2.31 and a beta of 1.28. The company has a quick ratio of 1.11, a current ratio of 1.15 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 2.00. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $97.73 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $87.63. NetApp, Inc. has a twelve month low of $60.92 and a twelve month high of $112.48.

NetApp (NASDAQ:NTAP) last announced its earnings results on Thursday, February 29th. The data storage provider reported $1.94 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.69 by $0.25. The business had revenue of $1.61 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.59 billion. NetApp had a return on equity of 109.49% and a net margin of 15.21%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 5.2% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $1.02 EPS. As a group, equities analysts anticipate that NetApp, Inc. will post 5.16 EPS for the current fiscal year.

NetApp Announces Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, April 24th. Shareholders of record on Friday, April 5th will be paid a $0.50 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, April 4th. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.96%. NetApp’s dividend payout ratio is currently 45.45%.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts recently issued reports on the company. Citigroup lifted their target price on NetApp from $90.00 to $110.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Tuesday, March 5th. StockNews.com cut NetApp from a “strong-buy” rating to a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, March 7th. Barclays lifted their target price on NetApp from $80.00 to $100.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, March 1st. TD Cowen boosted their price objective on NetApp from $100.00 to $120.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, March 1st. Finally, UBS Group boosted their price objective on NetApp from $93.00 to $96.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, March 1st. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, ten have issued a hold rating and six have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and a consensus target price of $97.94.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On NetApp

A number of institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in NTAP. Wellington Management Group LLP boosted its holdings in shares of NetApp by 70.3% in the 1st quarter. Wellington Management Group LLP now owns 8,329,363 shares of the data storage provider’s stock worth $691,339,000 after purchasing an additional 3,439,053 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of NetApp in the 4th quarter worth about $232,502,000. First Trust Advisors LP boosted its holdings in NetApp by 57.5% during the 4th quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 5,643,780 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $497,556,000 after acquiring an additional 2,059,574 shares during the period. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC boosted its holdings in NetApp by 254.8% during the 1st quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 2,304,512 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $241,905,000 after acquiring an additional 1,654,942 shares during the period. Finally, TD Asset Management Inc boosted its holdings in NetApp by 127.0% during the 4th quarter. TD Asset Management Inc now owns 1,698,277 shares of the data storage provider’s stock valued at $149,720,000 after acquiring an additional 950,204 shares during the period. 92.17% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

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.