F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) Sees Significant Increase in Short Interest

F5, Inc. (NASDAQ:FFIV) saw a significant growth in short interest during the month of October. As of October 31st, there was short interest totalling 2,320,000 shares, a growth of 9.4% from the October 15th total of 2,120,000 shares. Based on an average trading volume of 603,700 shares, the days-to-cover ratio is currently 3.8 days. Currently, 4.0% of the company’s shares are sold short.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, Director Alan Higginson sold 1,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, September 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $201.65, for a total value of $201,650.00. Following the completion of the sale, the director now owns 10,707 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,159,066.55. This represents a 8.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, CFO Francis J. Pelzer sold 600 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, September 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $217.50, for a total value of $130,500.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 30,425 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $6,617,437.50. The trade was a 1.93 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 3,750 shares of company stock worth $799,229 over the last three months. 0.58% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of F5

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Pacer Advisors Inc. increased its position in shares of F5 by 6,700.2% during the 2nd quarter. Pacer Advisors Inc. now owns 848,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock valued at $146,118,000 after purchasing an additional 835,912 shares during the period. Wedge Capital Management L L P NC bought a new stake in shares of F5 during the 3rd quarter worth $61,386,000. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of F5 by 1,681.1% during the 3rd quarter. Los Angeles Capital Management LLC now owns 285,639 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $62,898,000 after acquiring an additional 269,602 shares in the last quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of F5 by 48.9% during the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 652,972 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $111,932,000 after acquiring an additional 214,351 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC boosted its stake in shares of F5 by 3.6% during the 3rd quarter. Hotchkis & Wiley Capital Management LLC now owns 5,489,388 shares of the network technology company’s stock worth $1,208,763,000 after acquiring an additional 191,020 shares in the last quarter. 90.66% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

F5 Stock Up 0.7 %

NASDAQ:FFIV opened at $239.99 on Tuesday. The business’s 50 day moving average is $223.52 and its two-hundred day moving average is $194.99. F5 has a 52 week low of $159.01 and a 52 week high of $250.46. The company has a market cap of $13.99 billion, a PE ratio of 25.10, a P/E/G ratio of 3.22 and a beta of 1.05.

F5 (NASDAQ:FFIV) last released its earnings results on Monday, October 28th. The network technology company reported $3.67 EPS for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.45 by $0.22. F5 had a return on equity of 20.80% and a net margin of 20.13%. The company had revenue of $747.00 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $730.43 million. During the same quarter last year, the business posted $2.76 EPS. F5’s quarterly revenue was up 5.7% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that F5 will post 11.01 EPS for the current fiscal year.

F5 announced that its Board of Directors has authorized a share repurchase program on Monday, October 28th that authorizes the company to buyback $1.00 billion in outstanding shares. This buyback authorization authorizes the network technology company to purchase up to 7.9% of its stock through open market purchases. Stock buyback programs are often a sign that the company’s management believes its shares are undervalued.

Analyst Ratings Changes

FFIV has been the subject of several analyst reports. StockNews.com raised F5 from a “buy” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, October 29th. Royal Bank of Canada increased their price target on F5 from $205.00 to $240.00 and gave the company a “sector perform” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on F5 from $215.00 to $230.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Piper Sandler increased their price target on F5 from $186.00 to $246.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Tuesday, October 29th. Finally, Evercore ISI increased their price target on F5 from $180.00 to $210.00 and gave the company an “in-line” rating in a report on Tuesday, July 30th. Seven research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, two have assigned a buy rating and one has assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, F5 currently has an average rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $233.56.

About F5

F5, Inc provides multi-cloud application security and delivery solutions in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Asia Pacific region. The company’s distributed cloud services enable its customers to deploy, secure, and operate applications in any architecture, from on-premises to the public cloud.